r>y 
v     >.  1 


OF 


A    MANUAL 


OF 


ENGLISH  PEOSE  LITEEATUEE 


AUTHORIZED  AMERICAN  EDITION. 

Having  received  from  MESSRS.  GINN  &  COMPANY, 
Publishers,  of  Boston,  New  York,  and  Chicago, 
payment  for  the  copyright  in  America  of  my  "Manual 
of  English  Prose  Literature,"  I  assign  the  publishing 
rights  in  that  country  to  them. 


W.    MlNTO. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ABERDEBH, 
May    1887. 


A  MANUAL 


OF 


ENGLISH  PROSE  LITERATURE 


BIOGRAPHICAL  AND  CRITICAL 


DESIGNED    MAINLY   TO   SHOW 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  STYLE 


BY 

WILLIAM  MINTO,  M.A. 

PROFESSOR  OF  LOGIC  AND  LITERATURE  IN  TH« 
UNIVERSITY    OF    AKEUUEEN 


AUTHORIZED  AMERICAN  EDITION 


BOSTON,    U.S.A.: 
PUBLISHED  BY  GINN  &  COMPANY. 

1901 


PREFACE  TO  FIRST  EDITION. 


THE  main  design  of  this  book  is  to  assist  in  directing 
students  of  English  composition  to  the  merits  and  the  de- 
fects of  our  principal  writers  of  prose.  It  is  not,  however, 
merely  a  collection  of  received  critical  opinions.  It  may 
be  of  some  value  to  the  inquirer  after  general  informa- 
tion, as  well  as  to  readers  more  advanced  than  those  kept 
specially  in  view. 

The  characteristics  of  the  work  are  briefly  thesa  It 
deals  with  prose  alone,  assigning  books  of  fiction  to  the 
department  of  poetry;  it  endeavours  to  criticise  upon  a 
methodical  plan,  fully  explained  in  an  Introduction;  it 
selects  certain  leading  authors  for  full  criticism  and  exem- 
plification ;  and  it  gives  unusual  prominence  to  three  select 
authors  of  recent  data 

Little  need  be  said  to  justify  taking  up  Prose  by  itself. 
In  criticising  Poetry  we  are  met  by  very  different  con- 
siderations from  those  that  occur  in  the  other  kinds  of 
composition.  What  is  more,  many  people  not  particularly 
interested  in  Poetry  are  anxious  for  practical  purposes  to 
have  a  good  knowledge  of  Prose  style;  and  when  Prose 
and  Poetry  are  discussed  in  the  same  volume,  Prose  is 
generally  sacrificed  to  Poetry. 

In  excluding  Romance  or  Fiction  from  a  Manual  of 


Vi  PREFACE. 

Prose  Literature,  I  follow  a  division  suggested  by  the  late 
Professor  George  Moir,  in  his  treatises  on  Poetry,  Romance, 
and  Rhetoric.  Romance  has  a  closer  affinity  with  Poetry 
than  with  Prose :  it  is  cousin  to  Prose  but  sister  to  Poetry; 
it  has  the  Prose  features,  but  the  Poetical  spirit. 

The  advantages  of  criticising  upon  a  methodical  plan  in 
terms  previously  defined,  will  be  at  once  apparent.  Criti- 
cising methodically  is  like  ploughing  in  straight  lines :  we 
get  over  the  field  not  only  sooner,  but  to  much  better  pur- 
pose ;  besides,  it  is  easier  to  see  both  what  we  accomplish 
and  what  we  miss.  As  regards  the  defining  of  critical 
terms,  it  was  a  favourite  position  with  De  Quincey  that 
"before  absolute  and  philosophic  criticism  can  exist,  we 
must  have  a  good  psychology."  The  present  work  makes 
little  ^pretension  to  be  philosophic,  much  less  to  be  abso- 
lute; but  it  is  an  attempt  to  apply  in  criticism  some  of 
the  light  thrown  upon  the  analysis  of  style  by  the  newest 
psychology.  I  am  aware  that  methodical  critical  dissection 
is  considered  by  many  a  cold  disenchanting  process.  But 
however  cold  and  disenchanting,  it  is  indispensable  to  the 
student :  it  is  part  of  the  apprenticeship  that  every  work- 
man must  submit  to.  Before  learning  to  put  a  compli- 
cated mechanism  together,  we  must  take  it  to  pieces,  and 
study  the  parts  one  by  one.  If  the  student  goes  to  work 
at  random,  picking  up  a  hint  here  and  a  hint  there,  he  is 
completely  at  the  mercy  of  every  pedantry  that  comes  to 
him  under  the  sanction  of  a  popular  name.  The  only  true 
preservative  against  literary  crotchets  and  affectations,  is 
a  comprehensive  view  of  the  principal  arts  and  qualities, 
the  principal  means  and  ends,  of  style. 

It  may  be  said  that  criticism  on  a  uniform  plan  tends 
to  destroy  individuality ;  that  a  book  constructed  on  such 
a  plan  can  be  nothing  but  a  featureless  inventory.  This 
can  happen  only  if  the  plan  is  narrow,  and  if  specific 
modes  of  the  various  qualities  of  style  are  not  dis- 
tinguished with  sufficient  delicacy.  Uniformity  of  plan, 


PREFACE.  Vii 

so  far  from  destroying  individuality,  is  really  the  best  way 
to  bring  individual  characteristics  into  clear  prominence : 
if  all  are  subjected  to  the  same  examination,  the  range  of 
the  questions  being  sufficiently  wide,  individualities  are 
thrown  into  relief  with  much  greater  distinctness  than 
they  possibly  could  be  by  any  other  process.  In  the 
following  work,  the  account  of  each  author  contains  a 
preliminary  sketch  of  his  character;  the  analysis  that 
follows  may  be  viewed  as  a  means  of  tracing  the  outcome 
of  that  character  in  his  style,  and  of  making  his  peculiar- 
ities felt  more  vividly  by  bringing  him  into  extended 
comparison  with  others. 

The  student  should  be  warned  emphatically  against 
such  blind  guides  as  declaim  against  the  cramping  influ- 
ence of  rules  for  composition,  and  urge  us  to  work  out  our 
own  individuality  without  regard  to  the  precepts  of  the 
schools.  Sound  principles  of  composition  do  not  repress 
genius,  but  rather  do  genius  a  service  by  preventing  it 
from  dissipating  itself  in  unprofitable  eccentricities.  There 
is  eveiy  room  for  variety  within  the  conditions  adopted  in 
the  following  work :  indeed  their  chief  recommendation  is 
that  they  recognise  diversity  of  style  according  to  diver- 
sity of  subject  and  purpose.  Students  often  put  the  ques- 
tion, What  should  we  do  to  acquire  a  good  style  ?  A 
principal  aim  in  this  Manual  is  to  make  students  familiar 
with  the  fact  that  there  are  varieties  of  good  style.  In- 
stead of  aiming  blindly  at  the  acquisition  of  "  a  good  style," 
the  writer  of  the  speaker  should  first  study  his  audience, 
and  consider  how  he  wishes  to  affect  them;  and  then 
inquire  how  far  the  rhetorical  precepts  that  he  has  learnt 
will  help  him  to  accomplish  his  purpose,  and  how  far 
rhetorical  teachers  can  direct  him  to  the  causes  of  success 
in  those  that  have  best  accomplished  the  same  ends  in 
the  same  circumstances. 

Regarding  the  prominence  given  to  the  modern  authors, 
I  have  only  to  repeat  that  the  work  is  intended  mainly 


viii  PEEFACE. 

for  students,  and  to  say  that  the  most  rewarding  study  for 
them,  in  the  first  instance  at  least,  lies  in  the  more  recent 
(which  are  also  the  higher)  developments  of  prose  style. 
With  the  same  eye  to  the  primary  destination  of  the 
work,  I  have  said  comparatively  little  about  prose  writers 
anterior  to  the  age  of  Elizabeth. 

The  biographies  of  the  various  writers  are  brief;  but 
every  pains  has  been  taken  to  make  them  accurate.  The 
biographies  of  the  three  selected  modern  men  will  be 
found  to  be  more  complete  than  any  hitherto  published. 

January  25, 1872. 


.      ,:'  : 


PEEFACE  TO  SECOND  EDITION. 


THE  alterations  that  I  have  made  In  revising  this  book 
for  a  second  edition  have  been  mainly  in  one  direction. 
I  have  here  and  there  omitted  or  modified  passages  that 
might  have  seemed  to  countenance  the  idea  that  goodness 
or  badness  in  style  might  be  pronounced  upon  without 
reference  to  the  effect  aimed  at  by  the  writer.  This  I 
have  done  to  prevent  the  slightest  suspicion  that  the 
criticisms  in  this  book  consist  in  the  dogmatic  application 
of  any  absolute  standard  of  style.  In  spite  of  the  toler- 
ably plain  disclaimer  in  my  first  Preface,  this  absoluteness 
of  view  has  been  not  only  suspected,  but  alleged.  It  is 
true  I  have  not  been  able,  after  diligent  search,  to  find 
the  quotations  by  which  the  allegation  was  supported; 
nevertheless,  I  wish  to  place  the  purpose  of  the  book 
in  this  respect  beyond  the  possibility  of  honest  misap- 
prehension. 

Since  the  first  edition  was  issued,  Mr  Trevelyan's 
biography  of  Lord  Macaulay  has  appeared,  and  Mr  "  H.  A. 
Page  "  has  published  two  volumes  on  the  Life  and  Writ- 
ings of  De  Quincey.  My  sketches  of  Macaulay  and  De 
Quincey  can,  in  consequence,  no  longer  pretend  to  be 
"more  complete  than  any  hitherto  published." 

December  82,  I860. 


PREFACE  TO  THIRD  EDITION. 


FOR  this  issue  the  book  has  been  revised  throughout 
The  chief  changes  made  have  been  in  the  short  sketch 
of  the  life  of  Carlyle,  which  one  is  able  now  to  treat 
with  greater  freedom  as  well  as  fuller  knowledge.  The 
estimate  of  his  character  has  been  allowed  to  stand,  with 
only  a  few  verbal  alterations.  I  have  to  acknowledge 
many  excellent  suggestions  for  the  extension  of  the  work 
from  critics  who  have  spoken  favourably  on  the  whole 
of  its  plan  and  execution.  At  another  time  I  may  be 
able  to  give  effect  to  some  of  these  suggestions :  mean  • 
time,  the  tolerably  rapid  sale  of  a  large  edition  encourages 
me  to  believe  that  the  book  is  found  useful  in  its  present 
shape  as  a  contribution  to  the  study  of  a  wide  subject. 
Nobody  can  be  more  sensible  than  myself  that  I  have 
dealt  with  only  a  part  of  the  subject. 

July  1830, 


CONTENTS. 


INTRODUCTION. 

•Ml 

ELBMENTS  OF  STYLB,        .           •           .           .           .           •  8*14 

Vocabulary,     ....•••  2 

The  Sentence,  .....«•  3 

The  Paragraph,            ......  II 

Figures  of  Speech,        .            .            .            .            •            .  II 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLE,        ......  14-25 

Intellectual  Qualities — Simplicity  and  Clearness,      .            ,  15 
Emotional  Qualities- 
Strength,     ...•••«  19 
Pathos,         ....««•  2O 

The  Ludicrous,        ......  23 

Elegancies  of  Style — Melody,  Harmony,  Taste,          .           .  24 

KINDS  OF  COMPOSITION,  .           .                      .           •           .  26-28 


Description, 
Narration, 
Exposition, 
Persuasion, 


26 

27 
28 
28 


PART    L 
DE    QUINOEY— MACAULAY— CAELTLE. 

CHAP.  I.-THOMAS   DE    QUINCEY. 

Lmt,          !•«•••••  31 

CHARACTER,          ........  38 

OPINIONS — criticisms,        ......  46 


XU  CONTENTS. 

ELEMENTS  OP  STYLB — 

Vocabulary,     .......  49 

Sentences,                    •••••,  50 

Paragraphs,     .......  53 

Figures  of  Speech,       ••....  55 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLB— 

Simplicity,      .            ,            .            .            •  .          .            .  60 

Clearness,        .......  62 

Strength,         .*.....  64 

Pathos,            .......  68 

Humour,         .......  69 

Melody  and  Harmony,           .           .           .            .           .  71 

Taste,  .           .            .           ...           .           .           .  72 

KINDS  OF  COMPOSITION— 

Description,     .            .            .            .            .            .            .  72 

Narration,        .«•••••  74 

Exposition,      .......  75 

CHAP.  H.-THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

LIFE,         ........  77 

CHARACTER,           .           .           .           ..           .           .  81 

OPINIONS,  ........  85 

ELEMENTS  OF  STYLB— 

Vocabulary,    .           .           .           .           .           .           .  87 

Sentences,       .......  87 

Paragraphs,     .......  89 

Figures  of  Speech,      .           .           .           .           .           •  97 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLE— 

Simplicity,      .......  104 

Clearness,        .«••»••  107 
Strength,        ....•••109 

Pathos,            .......  113 

The  Ludicrous,             .            .            •            •            •            •  114 

Melody,  Harmony,  Toate,      .           .           .           .           .  115 

KINDS  OF  COMPOSITION — 

Description,    .           .           .           •           •           •           .  115 

Narration,         .              .             .              ••              •             .  Il8 

Exposition,     .           .           .           .           .           .           .  123 

Perauaaian,      .            .            .            .            .            .            •  124 

CHAP.  III.— THOMAS   CABLYLR 

LlFB,              ••••••••  '3' 

CHARACTER,           •••••••  136 

OPINIONS,  ...»••••  I4° 


CONTENTS.  Xiil 

ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE — 

Vocabulary,     .            ,            .            .            .            •            .  147 

Sentences,        .            ,            ,            ,            «            .            .  149 

Paragraphs,      .             .            .            ,            ,            .             .  152 

Figures  of  Speech,       ••••••  152 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLE— 

Simplicity,       .            .            .            .            .            .            .  159 

Clearness,        •••••••  161 

Strength,         •••••..  162 

Pathos,             .......  163 

The  Ludicrous,            .            .            .            .            .            .  163 

Melody,  Harmony,  Taste,       .            •           .           .           •  167 

KINDS  OP  COMPOSITION — 

Description,     .            .            .            .            .            .            .  169 

Narration,       •            ••••••  173 

Exposition,      ,            .            ,            .            ,            .            .  177 

Persuasion,     .....••  179 


PAET    II. 
PROSE    WRITERS    IN    HISTORICAL    ORDER. 

CHAP.  I.— PROSE  WRITERS  BEFORE  1580. 

FOURTEENTH  CENTURY  (Mandeville,  Chaucer,  Wicliffe,  Trevisa),  183 

FIFTEENTH  CENTURY  (Pecock,  Fortescue,  Capgrave,  Caxton, 

Fabyan,  &o.),  .......  186 

FIRST  HALF  OF  SIXTEENTH  CENTURY  (Berners,  More,  Elyot, 

Hall,  Tyndale,  CovenlHle,  Latimer,  Foxe,  &c.),  .  .  189 

THIRD  QUARTER  OF  SIXTKBNTH  CEJSTUKY  (Ascham,  Wilson, 

North,  Holinshed,  &c.),  .  .  .  .  .  197 

CHAP.  IL— FROM  1580  TO  1610. 

BIB  PHILIP  SIDNEY — 

Life,     .....  .         <  .  200 


Character,        .... 
Opinions,         ...» 
Elements  of  Style  (Personification),   . 
Qualities  of  Style  (Pathos,  Humour), 
Kiiida  of  Composition,  .  . 


201 
203 
204 
2O7 
212 


Xlv  CONTENTS. 

RICHARD  HOOKEE — 

Life,     ......;.  213 

Character,        .  .  .  .  .  .  .  215 

Opinions,         .......  217 

Elements  of  Style,       .  .  .  .  .  .  218 

Qualities  of  Style  (Confusion,  Pathos,  Melody),         .  .  221 

.  Kinds  of  Composition,  .  .  .  .  .  226 

JOHN  LYLY,          .......  227 

Euphuism  analysed,    ......  229 

OTHEB  WRITERS — 

Church  Controversialists  (Whitgift,  Cartwright,  Martin  Mar- 
prelate,  Parsons),  .  .  .  .  .  232 
Chroniclers  (Stow,  Speed),  .  .  .  .  .  234 
Historians  (Hayward,  Knolles,  Daniel),  .  .  .  234 
Antiquaries  (Camden,  Spelman,  Cotton),  .  .  .  235 
Maritime  Chroniclers  (Hakluyt,  Purchas,  &c.),  .  •  235 
Miscellaneous  (RALEIGH,  Burleigh,  Dekker,  James  I.,  Overbury),  236 


CHAP.  III^-FEOM  1610  TO  1640. 

FRANCIS  BACON— 

Life,     ........  239 

Character,        .......  240 

Opinions,         .......  242 

Elements  of  Style,       .          . . , :         .  .  .  .  244 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Clearness,  Strength),  .  .  248 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Narration,  Exposition,  Persuasion),  .  251 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Divines  under  James  (Field,  Andrewes,  Morton,  DONNE),     .  255 

Divines  under  Charles  /.  (Hall,  Chilliugwurth,  Hales),          .  257 

Chronicler  (Baker),      ......  259 

Antiquarians  (Usher,  Selden),  ....  259 

Historian  (Herbert  of  CherburyX        ....  260 

Miscellaneous  (Ben  Jouson,   Wotton,  Sandys,  Lithgow,  Bur- 
ton, Butter),         ......  260 


CHAP.  IV.— FBOM  1640  TO  1670. 

THOMAS  FULLEB — 

Life,    ........  264 

Character,        .......  265 

Elements  of  Style,       ......  266 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Perspicuity,  Pathos,  Wit  and 

Humour),              ......  269 


CONTENTS.  XV 

JIREMT  TAYLOR — 

Life,     ..*•••••  274 

Cl  1.1  ranter,         .  .  .  .  •  .  •  275 

Opinions,          .......  277 

Elements  of  Style  (Imagery), .....  278 

Qualities  of  Style  (Pedantry,  Strength,  Pathos),         .  .  281 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Description,  Exposition,  Persuasion),  .  287 

ABRAHAM  COWLET— 

Life,  t  .  .  .  .  .  .  289 

Character,        .......  290 

Elements  of  Style,       ......  292 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Strength,  "Wit  and  Humour),  294 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology  (Sanderson,  Pearson,  Baxter,  Owen,  Fox,  BUNYAN,  &c.),  299 

History  (CLARENDON,  &c.),     .  .  .  .  .  304 

Miscellaneous  (Howell,  Heylin,  Earle,  Sam.  Butler,  Felltham, 
BROWNE,    More,    Wilkins,    Digby,    Walton,    MILTON, 

Gauden,  HOBBES,  Harrington,  Sidney,  Needliam),          .  305 

CHAP.  V.-FBOM  1670  TO  170O. 

SIB  WILLIAM  TEMPLB — 

Life,     ........  316 

Character,        .  .  .  .  .  .  .  318 

Opinions,          .......  320 

Elements  of  Style  (Sentences  and  Paragraphs),  .  .  321 

Qualities  of  Style  (Precision,  Dignity,  Pathos,  Wit,  Taste),  .  327 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Narration),      .  .  .  .  331 

JOHN  DKYDEN,       .......  332 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology    (BARROW,     TILLOTSON,     Still  ingfleet,     Sherlock, 

SOUTH,  Sprat,  Burnet,  Penn,  Barclay,  Ellwood),  .  336 

Philosophy  (LocKE,  Cudworth,  Cumberland),  .  .  340 

History  (BeRNET,  Mackenzie,  Pepys,  Evelyn,  &c. ),   .  .  341 

Miscellaneous  tL' Estrange,  Blount,  Charleton,  Halifax,  Boyle, 

Newton,  Ray),      ......  343 

CHAP.  VI.-PKOM  1700  TO  1730. 

Introductory  Remarks,       ......  346 

DANIKL  DBFOB — 

Life,     ..••••••  347 

Character,        .  .  .  •  •  .  .  349 

Opinions,         .......  350 

Elements  of  Style,       .  .  .  .  •  .  351 


XVI  CONTENTS. 

Qualities    of   Style   (Simplicity,    Clearness,    Strength,    The 
Ludicrous),  ...... 

Rinds  of  Composition  (Description,  Narration,  Exposition),  . 
JONATHAN  SWIBT — 

Life,    ......*. 

Character,        ....... 

Opinions,          ....... 

Elements  of  Style  (Similitudes,  Allegory,  Irony),      .  . 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Clearness,  Strength,  Pathos, 
Satire),      ....... 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Persuasion),    .  .  .  • 

JOSEPH  ADDISON — 

Life,     ....«••• 

Character,        .....•• 

Opinions,         ....... 

Elements  of  Style  (Sentences),  .... 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Obscurity,  Wit,  Melody,  Taste), 
SIB  RICHARD  STEELK — 

Life,     >••••••• 

Character,        ....... 

Pathos,  ....... 

Humour,          ....... 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology  (Atterbnry,  Hoadley,  Clarke,  Toland,  Collins,  Wool- 
ston,  Tindal,  &c.),  ..... 

Philosophy  (Mandeville,  Wollaston,  Shaftesbury,  BERKELEY), 

History  (Echard,  Strype,  &c. ),  .... 

Miscellaneous  (Bentley,  Hughes,  Budgell,  Arbuthnot,  BoL- 
INOBROKE,  &c. ),  .  .  .  .  .  . 

CHAP.  VII.— FROM  178O  TO  176CX 

SAMUEL  JOHNSON — 
Life,    . 

Character,        .  . 

Opinions, 
Elements  of  Style  (Sentences 


Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity 


Clearness,  Strength,  Pathos, 


Ridicule,  and  Humour), 
Kinds  of  Composition, 
OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology    (Morgan,    Chubb,    Butler,    Warburton,    Leland, 

Lardner,   Foster,  Wesley,  Whitefield,  &c.), 
Philosophy  (Hutcheson,  Hartley,  Edwards,  HUME),  .  . 

History  (Hume,  Smollett,  Middleton,  &c.),     .  .  . 

Miscellaneous  (Franklin,  Mehuotli,  &c.),         .  .  • 


CONTENTS.  XV11 

CHAP.   VIII.— FROM   1760   TO   1790. 

EDMUND  BURKB — 

Life,    ..»•••••  440 

Character,        .......  443 

Opinions,         .......  446 

Elements  of  Style  (Figures  of  Speech),            .            .            .  448 

Qualities  of  Style  (Strength,  Ridicule,  Bad  Taste),   .            .  452 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Description,  Persuasion),        .            .  458 

OLIVER  GOLDSMITH — 

Life,     ........  461 

Character,        .......  462 

Opinions,         .......  464 

Elements  of  Style  (Sentences,  Epigram),        .            .            .  465 
Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,   Strength,   Pathos,  Wit  and 

Humour),              ......  468 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology  (Horsley,  Porteous,  Campbell),        .             .             .  473 
Philosophy  (Reid,  Tucker,  Price,  Priestley,  Beattie,  Campbell, 

Lord  Kames,  Blair,  Adam  Smith),           .             .             .  474 

History  (Robertson,  Gibbon,  Boswell),             .             .             .  481 
Miscellaneous  (Walpole,   "Junius"  (Francis),  Home  Tooke, 

Lord  Monboddo),             .....  486 

CHAP.   IX.— PBOM   1790   TO   1820. 

WILLIAM  PALBY — 

Life,     ........  492 

Chnracter,        .......  493 

Opinions,          .......  494 

Elements  of  Style  (Paragraphs),          ....  494 

Qualities  of  Style  (Simplicity,  Perspicuity),   .            .             .  497 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Description,  Exposition,  Persuasion),  499 

ROBERT  HALL — 

Life,     ........  504 

Character,        .......  505 

Opinions,         .......  506 

Elements  of  Style,       ......  507 

Qualities  of  Style  (Abstruseness,  Clearness,  Strength,  Pathos),  507 

Kinds  of  Composition  (Persuasion),    ....  512 

OTHER  WRITERS — 

Theology  (Simeon,  the  Milners,  Foster,  Parr,  Watson,  Wakefield),    513 
Philosophy  (Stewart,  Brown,   Bentham,  Coleridge,  Malthas, 

Ricardo,  Alison,  Disraeli),            ....  $16 

History  (Mitford,  Gillies),       .....  520 

Miscellaneous  (Cobbett,  Mackintosh),              ...  520 


CONTENTS. 


SHAP.  X.—  SELECT  WRITERS    OP    THE  EARLY  PART 
OF   THIS    CENTURY. 

Theology  (Chalmers),           ......  523 

History  (James  Mill,  Hallam,  Alison),       .             .             .             .  525 

I'kilosophy  (Hamilton),       ......  530 

Uisce/lit.neoiis  (Jeffrey,    Sydney   Smith,    Lamb,   Landor,   Hunt, 

liazlitt,  Wilson,  Luckhart),    .             ,            .            *            •  532 


A    MANUAL 


ENGLISH   PEOSE    LITERATURE, 


INTRODUCTION. 

In  the  case  of  the  authors  chosen  for  full  examination,  and  to  some 
extent  also  in  the  case  of  the  others,  the  various  peculiarities  of 
Style  are  taken  up  in  a  fixed  order ;  and  it  may  help  the  reader's 
memory  to  state  this  order  at  tlie  beginning. 

The  preliminary  account  of  each  author's  Character  is  intended 
mainly  as  an  introduction  to  the  characteristics  of  his  style  ;  and 
while  it  gratifies  a  natural  curiosity  in  repeating  what  is  known  of 
his  appearance  or  personality,  does  not  profess  to  be  a  complete 
account  of  the  man  in  all  his  relations,  public  and  domestic. 

The  analysis  of  the  style  proceeds  upon  the  following  order : 
Vocabulary,  Sentence  and  Paragraph,  and  Figures  of  Speech,  which 
may  be  called  the  ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE;  Simplicity,  Clearness, 
Strength,  Pathos,  Melody,  Harmony,  and  Taste,  the  QUALITIES  OP 
STYLE;  Description,  Narration,  Exposition,  Persuasion,  the  KINDS 
OF  COMPOSITION.  Upon  each  of  these  subdivisions  we  shall  make 
some  remarks,  endeavouring  to  justify  the  arrangement  wherever 
it  seems  to  be  open  to  objection  or  misapprehension. 

ELEMENTS    OF    STYLE. 

VOCABULARY. 

Command  of  language  is  the  author's  first  requisite.  A  good 
memory  for  words  is  no  less  indispensable  to  the  author  than  a 
good  memory  for  forms  is  to  the  painter.  Words  are  the  material 


2  INTRODUCTION. 

that  the  author  works  in,  and  it  is  necessary  above  everything  that 
he  should  have  a  large  store  at  his  command. 

Probably  no  man  has  ever  been  master  of  the  whole  wealth  of 
the  English  vocabulary.  The  extent  of  each  man's  mastery  can 
be  ascertained  with  exactness  only  by  an  actual  numerical  calcu- 
lation, such  as  has  been  made  for  the  poetry  of  Shakspeare  and 
Milton.  This  has  not  yet  been  attempted  for  any  of  our  great 
prose  writers ;  and  until  some  enthusiast  arises  with  sufficient 
industry  for  such  a  labour,  we  must  be  content  with  a  vague 
estimate,  formed  upon  our  general  impression  of  freshness  and 
variety  of  diction. 

The  simple  fact  of  holding  a  place  among  the  leaders  of  liter- 
ature is  a  proof  of  extraordinary  mastery  of  language.  But  can 
we,  without  actual  numeration,  distinguish  degrees  of  mastery  ? 
Most  probably  we  can.  We  could  have  told  from  a  general  im- 
pression, without  actually  counting,  that  Shakspeare  uses  a  greater 
variety  of  words  than  Milton.  We  can  perceive,  without  referring 
to  the  enlargement 'of  dictionaries,  that  our  language  has  increased 
in  scope  and  flexibility  since  the  middle  of  last  century.  In  like 
manner  we  can  fix  relatively  any  author's  command  of  words.  We 
may  say  with  confidence  that  Defoe  is  more  copious  and  varied 
than  Addison,  and  Burke  than  Johnson ;  and,  although  our 
judgment  of  modern  writers  is  more  liable  to  error,  we  may  . 
venture  to  say  that  Dej^jjjncgyj  M^caulav.  and  CarlyJe  show.' 
a  greater  command  of^xpression  than  auyi'prose  writers  of  their 
generation. 

It  is  interesting,  also,  to  observe  on  what  special  subjects  an 
author's  expression  is  most  copious  and  original.  Perhaps  no  one 
has  an  equal  abundance  of  words  for  all  purposes.  From  the  in- 
evitable limitation  of  human  faculties,  no  man,  however  "  myriad- 
minded,"  can  give  his  attention  to  everything.  Inevitably  every 
man  falls  into  special  tracks  of  observation,  reflection,  and  im- 
agination ;  and  each  man  accumulates  words,  and  expresses  him- 
self with  fluency  and  variety,  concerning  the  subjects  that  are 
oftenest  in  his  thoughts.  Were  we  to  apply  the  test  of  arithmetic, 
we  should  find  that  two  men  using  very  much  the  same  number  of 
words  upon  the  whole,  have  the  depths  and  shallows  of  their  verbal 
wealth  at  very  different  places. 

To  mark  out  fully  where  a  vocabulary  is  weak  and  where  it  is 
strong,  we  should  have  to  anticipate  the  qualities  of  style  and  the 
kinds  of  composition.  A  man  that  can  wiite  freely  and  eloquently 
in  one  strain  or  in  one  species  of  composition,  may  be  dry  and 
barren  in  another  strain  or  another  species  of  composition.  Most 
writers  have  some  one  vein  that  they  peculiarly  and  obviously 
excel  in.  Thus  Addison  is  rich  in  the  language  of  melodious  and 
elegant  simplicity,  Paley  in  the  language  of  homely  simplicity, 


ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE.  3 

the  language  of  elaborate  stateliness,  Macaulay  in 

fnguage  of  brilliant  energy. 
Here  it  may  be  well  to  point  out — and  the  caution  is  of  such 
importance  that  it  may  have  to  be  repeated — that  the  divisions  in 
the  following  analysis  are  not,  in  the  language  of  the  logicians, 
mutually  exclusive.  Following  Professor  Bain's  Rhetoric  we  con- 
sider style  under  three  different  aspects — approach  it  from  three 
different  sides ;  but  we  do  not  treat  of  different  things.  In  each 
of  the  divisions  the  same  things  are  examined,  only  from  different 
points  of  view.  Each  of  these  divisions,  were  our  examination  to 
be  ideally  thorough,  should  exhibit  every  possible  excellence  and 
defect  of  style.  We  might  take  up  all  the  notable  points  in  an 
author's  style  under  what  we  have  called  the  "  Elements  of  Style  " 
— the  choice  of  words,  plain  and  figurative,  and  the  arrangement 
of  these  in  sentences  and  paragraphs.  We  might,  again,  take  up 
everything  remarkable  under  the  "  Qualities  of  Style  " — simplicity, 
clearness,  and  so  forth  :  a  style  is  good  or  bad  according  as  it  pro- 
duces, or  fails  to  produce,  certain  effects.  Finally,  we  might  com- 
prehend the  whole  art  of  style  under  the  "  Kinds  of  Composition  "  : 
every  excellence  of  style  is  either  good  description,  good  narration, 
good  exposition,  good  persuasion,  or  good  poetry.  The  divisions 
are  far  from  being  mutually  exclusiva  Were  we  to  say  in  one 
department  all  that  might  be  said,  we  should  leave  nothing  for 
the  others.  The  sole  justification  of  having  three,  and  not  one, 
is  practical  convenience.  There  must  of  necessity  be  occasional 
repetitions,  but  each  department  has  certain  arts  of  style  that  are 
best  regarded  from  its  own  particular  point  of  view. 

THE   SENTENCE. 

The  construction  of  sentences  is  an  important  part  of  style. 
Sometimes,  indeed,  it  is  expressed  by  the  word  style,  as  if  it  con- 
stituted the  whole  art.  With  a  nearer  approach  to  accuracy,  it  is 
sometimes  called  the  mechanical  part  of  style.  This  designation 
may  be  allowed,  if  sentence-building  is  loosely  taken  to  include  the 
construction  of  paragraphs  and  the  general  method  of  a  discourse. 
It  is  probably  true  that  the  construction  of  sentences  and  of  para- 
graphs, in  so  far  as  they  are  intended  for  the  communication  of 
knowledge,  may  be  subjected  to  more  precise  rules  than  any  other 
processes  of  the  art  of  composition.  The  principles  on  which  these 
rules  are  founded  are  capable  of  extension  to  the  method  of  whole 
chapters  or  essays.  But  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  a  writer 
can  benefit  from  direct  precept  chiefly  as  regards  the  easy,  clear,  and 
complete  communication  of  what  is  in  his  thoughts ;  for  any  effect 
of  style  beyond  this,  precepts  are  of  comparatively  little  service. 

SPECIAL  ARTIFICES  OP  CONSTRUCTION. — One  may  doubt  whether 
Jit  would  be  practicable  to  make  anything  like  a  comprehensive 


4  INTEODUCTION. 

collection  of  all  the  forms  of  sentence  possible  in  English.  At 
any  rate,  it  has  not  yet  been  done.  Writers  on  composition  have 
hitherto  attempted  nothing  more  than  to  distinguish  a  few  well- 
marked  modes  of  construction. 

I.  The  Periodic  Structure. — "A  period,"  says  Campbell,  "is 
a  complex  sentence,  wherein  the  meaning  remains  suspended  till 
the  whole  is  finished.  .  .  .  The  criterion  of  a  period  is  this : 
If  you  stop  anywhere  before  the  end,  the  preceding  words  will  not 
form  a  sentence,  and  therefore  cannot  convey  any  determined 
sense."  This  is  the  common  definition  of  a  period,  and  it  is 
probably  difficult  to  go  farther  without  committing  one's  self  to 
general  statements  that  will  not  apply  to  every  period.  At  the 
risk  of  being  slightly  inaccurate,  it  might  be  well  to  go  a  little 
deeper  into  the  substance  of  the  periodic  structure.  What  exactly 
do  we  imply  by  saying  that  the  meaning  is  suspended  till  the 
close  ?  We  imply  that  the  reader's  interest  is  kept  in  suspense 
till  the  close.  And  how  is  this  done  ?  Generally,  it  may  be  said, 
by  bringing  on  predicates  before  what  they  are  predicated  of,  and, 
which  is  virtually  a  similar  process,  qualifications  before  what  they 
qualify ;  letting  us  know  descriptive  adjuncts,  results,  conditions, 
alternatives,  oratorical  contrasts,  of  subjects,  states,  or  actions,  be- 
fore we  formally  know  the  particular  subjects,  states,  or  actions 
contemplated  by  the  writer.  Thus,  in  the  following  sentence — 

"On  whatever  side  we  contemplate  Homer,  what  principally  strikes  us  is 
his  invention ; " 

the  subject — in  this  case  the  key- word — is  reserved  to  the  last, 
and  the  adverbial  adjuncts  of  the  predicate  are  stated  before  the 
predicate  itself.  A  statement  is  made  in  a  form  showing  that  it 
has  a  bearing  upon  something  to  follow,  and  our  curiosity  is  awak- 
ened to  know  what  that  something  is.  "  On  whatever  side  we  con- 
template Homer."  The  next  statement,  "what  principally  strikes 
us,"  contracts  our  curiosity  into  a  more  definite  field,  and  thereby 
sharpens  our  interest.  Still  it  points  us  forward.  There  is  a  pro- 
gress from  the  indefinite  to  the  definite,  and,  in  the  case  of  this 
particular  period,  a  growing  interest,  which  is  not  relieved  till  we 
reach  the  very  last  word.  In  a  loose  structure  of  sentence,  which 
may  be  called  the  natural  or  usual  structure  in  English,  the  pre- 
dicate follows  the  subject,  and  qualifying  adjuncts  follow  what 
they  qualify :  we  know  the  subject  before  we  know  the  attribute 
predicated  of  it  or  annexed  to  it.  In  a  period,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  writer,  stating  the  predicate  or  qualifying  adjuncts  of  a  word 
before  the  word  itself,  may  be  said  to  circumvent  that  word — to 
make  (as  the  Greek  periodos  signifies)  a  "  circuit "  about  it,  to  bring 
its  predicate  or  its  adjuncts,  as  the  case  may  be,  from  behind  it  and 
place  them  before  it 


ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE.  6 

Campbell  speaks  of  the  period  as  a  "  complex  "  sentence.  If 
the  above  view  of  the  period  is  accepted  as  substantially  correct, 
"  complexity,"  in  the  grammatical  sense,  must  be  regarded  as  an 
accident  of  the  period,  and  not  part  of  its  essenca  The  statements 
of  other  writers  on  composition  warrant  us  in  applying  the  term 
period  to  sentences  that  are  not  complex.  Professor  Bain  simply 
says  that,  "  in  a  periodic  sentence,  the  meaning  is  suspended  until 
the  close,"  and  makes  no  mention  of  a  periodic  sentence  being  neces- 
sarily complex.  And  Whately  gives,  as  an  example  of  periodic 
structure,  the  following  "  simple  "  sentence  :  "  One  of  the  most  cele- 
brated of  men  for  wisdom  and  for  prosperity  was  Solomon." 

It  would  be  wett  if  the  application  of  the  term  periodic  were  a 
little  extended.  ^When  qualifying  adjuncts  are  brought  in  before 
their  exact  bearing  is  known,  and  in  such  a  way  as  to  stimulate 
curiosity,  a  peculiar  effect  is  produced ;  and  we  should  be  justified 
by  the  derivation  of  the  word  "periodic"  in  applying  it  to  all 
marked  cases  of  such  anticipation^  Practically,  indeed,  the  word 
is  applied  in  the  wider  sense.  If  Campbell's  definition  were  rigor- 
ously adhered  to,  the  term  periodic  could  be  applied  only  to  sen- 
tences that  keep  the  reader  in  suspense  up  to  the  very  last  word. 
But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  term  is  applied  much  more  widely. 
We  speak  of  writers  as  having  a  periodic  •  style,  although  their 
works  contain  few  complete  periods,  according  to  Campbell's 
"criterion  of  a  period."  Since,  therefore,  the  narrow  definition  of 
the  term  is  practically  disregarded,  it  would  be  well  to  come  to  a 
formal  understanding  of  its  latitude.  fThe  term  "  period  "  might 
still  be  retained  for  a  periodic  sentence,  rigorously  complete  or 
nearly  so.'NfBut  it  would  probably  better  suit  the  prevailing 
application  ot  the  term  "periodic"  to  accept  it  as  a  name  for 
such  anticipations  as  I  have  roughly  indicated  —  to  call  every 
style  "  periodic "  where  such  anticipations  habitually  occur^  Of 
this  periodic  style,  the  most  eminent  of  modern  masters  is  De 
Quincey. 

In  the  loose  sentence  —  in  a  sentence  so  constructed  as  to  be 
noticeably  "  loose " —  qualifying  and  explanatory  adjuncts  are 
tacked  on  after  the  words  they  refer  to.  This  might  be  copiously 
exemplified  from  the  writings  of  Carlyle,  and,  in  a  less  degree, 
from  Addison. 

The  effect  of  the  periodic  structure  is  to  .keep  the  mind  in  a  state 
of  uniform  or  increasing  tension  until  the  denouement.  This  is  the 
effect  stated  in  its  ultimate  and  most  general  form.  The  effect 
that  a  reader  is  conscious  of  receiving  varies  greatly  with  the 
nature  of  the  subject-matter. "-  When  the  subject  is  easy  and  / 
familiar,  the  reader,  finding  the  sentence  or  clause  come  to  an  end 
as  soon  as  his  expectations  are  satisfied,  receives  an  agreeable  im- 
pression of  neatness  and  finish.  When  the  subject-matter  is  un-  2, 


6  INTRODUCTION. 

familiar,  or  when  the  suspense  is  unduly  prolonged,  the  periodic 
structure  is  intolerably  tedious,  or  intolerably  exasperating,  accord 
ing  to  the  temper  of  the  reader.  In  impassioned  writing  the 
period  has  a  moderating  effect,  the  tension  of  the  mind  till  the 
key-word  is  reached  preventing  a  dissipation  of  excitement. 

Dr  Blair  says  that  the  periodic  style  is  "  the  most  pompous, 
musical,  and  oratorical  manner  of  composing,"  and  that  it  "  gives 
an  air  of  gravity  and  dignity  to  composition."  The  Doctor  pro- 
bably had  in  his  eye  such  periodic  writers  as  Hooker,  Sir  Thomas 
Browne,  and  Johnson.  Undoubtedly  long  periodic  sentences  give 
great  scope  for  pomp,  music,  gravity,  dignity,  and  such  effects,  but 
these  are  not  necessary  attributes  of  the  period.  A  period,  as  we 
have  defined  it,  need  not  be  long ;  and  a  lively  interest  may  be 
sustained  as  well  as  a  grave  interest. 

Advantages  and  disadvantages  of  the  periodic  structure. — To 
some  extent  we  have  anticipated  these  in  considering  the  effect 
of  the  period. 

In  light  subjects,  neatness  or  finish  is  generally  regarded  as 
an  advantaga  Yet  even  in  this  a  caution  is  needed ;  rounded 
neatness,  if  it  recurs  too  frequently,  may  become  tiresome.  The 
caution  can  probably  be  given  in  no  more  definite  form  than 
Hamlet's  :  "Be  not  too  periodic  neither,  but  let  your  own  discretion 
be  your  tutor." 

In  unfamiliar  subjects,  care  must  be  taken  that  the  considera- 
tions kept  in  suspense  be  not  too  numerous  or  too  abstruse.  De 
Quincey  has  vividly  described  "  the  effect  of  weariness  and  repul- 
sion Avhich  may  arise  from  this  single  vice  of  unwieldy  compre- 
hensiveness in  the  structure  of  sentences."  "  Those  who  are  not 
accustomed  to  watch  the  effects  of  composition  upon  the  feelings, 
or  have  had  little  experience  in  voluminous  reading  pursued  for 
weeks,  would  scarcely  imagine  how  much  of  downright  physical 
exhaustion  is  produced  by  what  is  technically  called  the  periodic 
style  of  writing.  It  is  not  the  length,  the  &irepavro\oyla,  the  par- 
alytic flux  of  words.  It  is  not  even  the  cumbrous  involution  of 
parts  within  parts,  separately  considered,  that  bears  so  heavily 
upon  the  attention.  It  is  the  suspense,  the  holding  on  of  the 
mind  until  what  is  called  the  dir<*So«m,  or  coming  round  of  th« 
sentence,  commences.  This  it  is  which  wears  out  the  faculty  of 
attention.  A  sentence,  for  example,  begins  with  a  series  of  ifs; 
perhaps  a  dozen  lines  are  occupied  with  expanding  the  condi- 
tions under  which  something  is  affirmed  or  denied.  Here  you 
cannot  dismiss  and  have  done  with  the  ideas  as  you  go  along; 
for  as  yet  all  is  hypothetic — all  is  suspended  in  air.  The  con- 
ditions are  not  fully  to  be  understood  until  you  are  acquainted 
with  the  dependency :  you  must  give  a  separate  attention  to  each 
clause  of  this  complex  hypothesis,  and  yet,  having  done  that  by  a 


ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE.  7 

painful  effort,  you  have  done  nothing  at  all ;  for  you  must  exercise 
a  reacting  attention  through  the  corresponding  latter  section,  in 
order  to  follow  out  its  relations  to  all  parts  of  the  hypothesis  which 
sustains  it."  These  remarks  point  to  the  abuse  rather  than  to  the 
use  of  the  periodic  style,  and  were  directed  against  a  prevailing 
style  in  newspaper  "leaders."  It  is  obviously  necessary,  for  the 
avoiding  of  perplexity,  not  to  bring  in  too  many  or  too  abstruse 
considerations  before  their  bearing  is  made  known.  A  writer  with 
the  least  regard  for  his  readers,  should  see  that  by  so  doing  he 
exacts  too  severe  an  effort  of  attention.  It  may  safely  be  laid 
down  that  the  longer  a  period  is,  the  simpler  should  be  both  the 
language  and  the  matter  of  the  suspended  clauses.  Still  more 
must  this  be  kept  in  view  when  the  principle  of  the  periodic 
structure  is  extended  to  paragraphs  or  chapters. 

Mr  Herbert  Spencer  in  his  '  Essay  on  the  Philosophy  of  Style,' 
and  Professor  Bain  in  his  Rhetoric,  advocate  what  we  have  de- 
fined as  periodic  structure,  ou  the  ground  that  it  enables  us  to 
apprehend  the  meaning  of  a  complex  statement  with  less  risk  of 
confusion.  The  advantage  of  placing  qualifying  words  before  the 
object  that  they  qualify  is  briefly  stated  in  Bain's  Rhetoric,  under 
the  "  order  of  words." 

The  legitimate  use  of  the  periodic  structure  in  impassioned  prose 
is  best  seen  in  the  so-called  "  prose  fantasies  "  of  De  Qnipcqy. 

II.  Sentences  studiously  Long  and  studiously  Short. — No 
smali  element  in  the  mechanical  art  of  sentence-building  is  the 
adjustment  of  the  length  of  the  sentence.  One  of  the  greatest 
faults  in  our  early  writers  is  that  their  sentences  are  too  long. 
They  did  not  know  when  to  stop.  They  seem  to  have  been  afraid 
to  let  a  sentence  out  of  their  hands  till  they  had  tacked  on  all  the 
more  important  qualifications  of  the  main  statement.  They  thus 
frequently  ran  on  to  a  most  cumbrous  length ;  and  when  they  did 
proceed  to  a  new  sentence,  frequently  took  no  pains  to  connect  it 
with  the  preceding  main  statement,  but  started  off  in  pursuit  of 
some  subordinate  idea  suggested  by  one  of  the  qualifying  state- 
ments. So  defective,  indeed,  were  they  in  sentence-structure,  that 
it  is  dangerous  for  a  beginner  in  composition  to  spend  much  time 
in  their  company.  And  one  great  part  of  this  deficiency  was,  that 
they  did  not  know  when  to  end  a  sentence,  or,  in  other  words,  that 
they  had  not  the  art  of  beginning  a  new  sentence  at  the  proper 
point 

It  would  be  absurd  to  prescribe  a  definite  limit  for  the  length  of 
sentences,  or  even  to  say  in  what  proportion  long  and  short  should 
be  intermixed.  Here,  too,  discretion  is  the  tutor.  Only  it  must 
be  borne  in  mind  that  a  long  series  either  of  very  short  sentences 
or  of  very  long  sentences  is  tiresome. 

The  distinction  between  the  "  periodic  style  "  (gtyle  periodique) 


8  INTRODUCTION. 

and  the  "abrupt  style"  (style  coupe)  depends  to  a  great  extent 
upon  the  length  of  the  sentences.  The  Periodic  style  (as  we  see 
from  its  description  by  De  Quincey)  implies  something  more  than 
the  use  of  the  periodic  structure ;  it  implies  long  periods,  elabo- 
rately constructed,  holding  "  a  flock  of  clauses  "  in  suspense,  and 
moving  with  a  stately  rhythm.  So  in  the  Abrupt  style,  the  short 
sentence  is  an  important  feature,  although,  as  appears  in  the  style 
of  Macaulay,  it  is  not  the  only  feature.1 

The  use  of  a  startling  series  of  short  sentences  may  almost  be 
said  to  be  a  feature  of  English  oratory.  We  find  it  in  the  journals 
of  the  Elizabethan  Parliaments ;  and,  later,  in  the  writings  of 
Bolingbroke,  in  the  published  speeches  of  Chatham,  and  in  the 
speeches  and  writings  of  Burke. 

The  lo^g  sentence,  formed  of  several  members  gradually  increas- 
ing in  length  so  as  to  make  a  climax  in  sound,  would  universally 
be  designated  oratorical.  It  was  much  affected  by  Cicero. 

III.  The  Balanced  Sentence. — "  When  the  different  clauses  of 
a  compound  sentence  are  made  similar  in  form,  they  are  said  to  be 
balanced." 

The  artifice  of  constructing  successive  clauses  upon  the  same 
plan  is  said  to  have  been  introduced  into  our  language  from  the 
Italian.  Wherever  it  came  from,  it  begins  to  appear  noticeably 
about  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century.  In  Elizabeth's  reign 
it  became  very  fashionable.  It  was  one  feature  of  Lyly's 
"Euphuism."  It  held  its  ground  through  the  reign  of  James, 
appearing  even  in  booksellers'  advertisements  and  in  the  titles 
of  maps.  One  of  John  Speed's  maps  is  entitled,  'A  new  and 
accurate  map  of  the  world,  drawn  according  to  the  truest  descrip- . 
tions,  latest  discoveries,  and  best  observations,  that  have  been  made 
by  English  or  strangers.' 

The  advantages  of  the  balanced  structure  are  pointed  out  briefly, 
but  fully,  in  Bain's  Rhetoric.  /  It  is  a  pleasure  in  itself  j^when  not 
carried  to  excess,  it  is  a  help  to  the  memory^  and,  when  the  bal- 
anced clauses  stand  in  antithesis,  it  lends  emphasis  to  the  opposi- 
tion. We  find  also  in  practice  that  it  serves  as  a  guide  to  the 
proper  arrangement  of  the  important  words.  Under  a  natural 
sense  of  effect  the  important  word  is  often  reserved  for  the  last 
place,  the  best  position  for  emphasis.  Further,  in  impassioned 
prose,  as  in  Raleigh's  invocation  to  Death,  and  Jfo  Quinsy's  imi- 
tations— the  invocations  to  Opium  and  to  Solitude-^balance  has 
something  of  the  effect  of  metre. 

1  While  speaking  of  these  general  distinctions  of  style,  we  may  note  a  third, 
the  Pointed  style,  consisting  in  "  the  profuse  employment  of  the  Balanced  Sen- 
tence, in  conjunction  with  Antithesis,  Epigram,  and  Climax."  How  far  these 
distinctions  are  from  being  distinctive,  in  the  sense  of  indicating  incompatible 
modes  of  composition,  may  be  judged  from  the  fact  that  Dr  Johnson  often  em- 
ploys all  the  three  "styles"  in  one  paragraph. 


ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE.  9 

In  the  case  of  balance,  much  more  than  in  the  case  of  the 
periodic  structure,  it  is  necessary  to  beware  of  going  to  excess. 
There  is  almost  no  limit  to  the  means  of  disguising  the  periodic 
structure.  The  reader  may  be  entertained  with  such  variety  in 
the  parts  of  a  period,  that  he  enjoys  its  bracing  effects  without 
knowing  the  cause.  But  the  balanced  structure  cannot  be  so 
disguised :  it  is  like  metre — to  disguise  it  is  to  destroy  it  Clauses 
are  constructed  on  the  same  plan,  or  they  are  not ;  corresponding 
words  occupy  corresponding  places  in  their  respective  clauses,  or 
they  do  not  And  while  the  balanced  structure  is  prominent,  and 
thus  apt  to  fatigue  the  ear,  it  is  very  catching ;  it  has  a  great 
power  of  enslaving  whoever  employs  it  heedlessly.  Several  of  our 
writers,  such  as  Johnson,  "  Junius,"  and  Macaulav,  allowed  their 
ear  to  be  captivated,  and  not  only  employed  balanced  forms  to 
excess,  but  often  added  tautologous  and  otherwise  questionable 
clauses  from  an  irresistible  craving  for  the  familiar  measure. 

IV.  The  Condensed  Sentence. — "This  is  a  sentence  abbrevi- 
ated by  a  forced  and  unusual  construction." 

Anything  so  violently  artificial  as  this  can  be  used  but  seldom 
without  giving  offence.  It  was  a  favourite  artifice  with  Gibbon. 
In  the  present  day,  when  used  at  all,  it  is  used  chiefly  for  comic 
purposes.  Readers  of  Dickens  and  his  imitators  are  familiar  with 
such  terms  as  "  drew  tears  from  his  eyes  and  a  handkerchief  from 
his  pocket."  Occasionally  we  find  it  in  works  of  more  serious 
pretensions,  as  in  Mr  Forster's  Life  of  Goldsmith ;  but  nobody 
now  uses  it  for  serious  purposes  so  often  as  Gibbon  did. 

GENERAL  CONSIDERATIONS. — I.  The  Emphatic  Places  of  a 
Sentence. — "  As  in  an  army  on  the  march,  the  fighting  columns 
are  placed  front  and  rear,  and  the  baggage  in  the  centre,  so  the 
emphatic  parts  of  a  sentence  should  be  found  either  in  the  be- 
ginning or  in  the  end,  subordinate  and  matter-of-course  expressions 
in  the  middle." 

There  is  nothing  more  urgently  required  for  the  improvement 
of  our  sentences  than  a  constant  study  to  observe  this  principle. 
The  special  artifices  that  we  have  mentioned  are  good  only  for 
certain  modes  of  composition  and  for  particular  purposes,  and 
become  offensive  when  too  often  repeated;  but  it  is  difficult  to 
conceive  when  there  would  be  an  impropriety  in  placing  important 
words  where  the  reader  naturally  expects  to  find  them.  The 
reader's  attention  falls  easily  and  naturally  upon  what  stands  at 
the  beginning  and  what  stands  at  the  end,  unless  obviously  in- 
troductory in  the  one  case,  or  obviously  rounding  off  in  the  other. 
The  beginning  and  the  end  are  the  natural  places  for  the  im- 
portant words.  This  arrangement  is  conducive  both  to  clearness 
and  to  elegance  :  it  prevents  confusion,  and  is  an  aid  to  justness 
of  emphasis.  Aa  important  words  need  not  occupy  absolutely  the 


10  INTRODUCTION. 

first  place  nor  absolutely  the  last,  but  at  the  beginning  may  be 
preceded  by  qualifying  clauses,  and  at  the  end  may  be  followed 
by  unemphatic  appendages  that  are  not  of  a  nature  to  distract 
attention,  we  are  not  required  to  make  unnatural  inversions  or 
to  take  unidiomatic  liberties  of  any  kind.  If  a  writer  finds  a 
construction  stiff  and  unnatural,  he  may  be  sure  that  he  has 
not  succeeded  in  throwing  the  emphasis  where  it  should  be 
thrown ;  if  he  has  not  buried  the  important  words  in  the  depths 
of  the  sentence,  he  has  probably  dune  worse  :  he  has  probably 
drawn  off  the  reader's  attention  from  the  words  altogether,  and 
fixed  it  where  it  should  seldom  or  never  be  fixed  —  upon  the 
form. 

The  following  out  of  this  principle  is  not  so  easy  as  it  appears. 
One  is  safe  to  assert  that  it  will  never  be  carried  out  thoroughly 
till  it  is  made  an  important  part  of  school  drill.  Without  some 
such  long  and  early  training,  a  scrupulous  purist  in  this  respect 
might  hang  as  long  over  his  sentences  as  Lord  Tennyson  is  said 
to  hang  over  his  lines,  and  commit  blunders  after  all.  In  bring- 
ing sentences  into  harmony  with  this  principle  of  arrangement 
alone,  there  is  a  field  for  endless  variety  of  school  exercises  in 
composition. 

II.  Unity  of  Sentence. — Upon  this  point  it  is  especially 
dangerous  to  lay  down  any  abstract  rule.  Irving's  statements, 
that  "a  sentence  or  period  ought  to  express  one  entire  thought 
or  mental  proposition,"  and  that  "  it  is  improper  to  connect  in 
language  things  which  are  separated  in  reality,"  are  much  too 
dogmatic  and  cramping.  Separate  particulars  must  often  be 
brought  together  in  the  same  sentenca 

The  only  universal  caution  that  can  be  given  is,  to  beware  of 
distracting  from  the  effect  of  the  main  statement  by  particulars 
not  immediately  relevant.  "Every  part  should  be  subservient 
to  one  principal  affirmation." 

The  advice  not  to  overcrowd  a  sentence  may  have  to  yield  to  a 
law  of  the  paragraph  concerning  the  due  subordination  in  form 
of  whatever  is  subordinate  in  meaning.  "  A  statement  merely 
explanatory  or  qualifying,  put  into  a  sentence  apart,  acquires  a 
dangerous  prominence." 

Most  of  the  faults  specified  by  Blair  as  breaches  of  "  unity " 
occur  in  connection  with  other  arts  of  sentence-structure.  "  Ex- 
cess of  parenthetical  clauses  "  is  an  abuse  of  the  periodic  structure, 
objectionable  only  in  so  far  as  it  imposes  too  severe  a  strain  upon 
the  retentive  powers  of  the  reader.  It  is  a  fault  often  committed 
by  P®  Quincey,  whose  own  powers  of  holding  several  things  in  the 
mind  at  once  without  confusion  sometimes  betrayed  him  into  for- 
getting that  all  are  not  equally  gifted.  The  fault  of  not  "bring- 
ing the  sentence  to  a  full  and  perfect  close  " — BO  flagrant  in  our 


ELEMENTS   OF  STYLE.  11 

early  writers — is  not  likely  to  be  committed  by  any  one  aware 
of  the  value  of  the  end  of  a  sentence  as  the  place  for  important 
words. 

The  specialties  of  the  sentence  in  Narrative  and  in  Description  are 
examined  at  length  in  Bain's  Rhetoric  (THE  SENTENCE,  sec.  25). 
He  says  that  "  the  only  rule  that  can  be  observed  in  distinguish- 
ing the  sentences  is  to  choose  the  larger  breaks  in  the  sense." 

THE   PARAGRAPH. 

Professor  Bain  was  the  first,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  to  consider 
how  far  rules  can  be  laid  down  for  the  perspicuous  construction  of 
paragraphs.  Other  writers  on  composition,  such  as  Campbell,  Lord 
Kames,  Blair,  and  Whately,  stop  short  with  the  sentence. 

Dg  Quiacev.  a  close  student  of  the  art  of  composition,  felt  the 
importance^  of  looking  beyond  the  arrangement  of  the  parts  of  a 
sentence,  and  philosophised  in  a  desultory  way  concerning  the 
bearing  that  one  sentence  should  have  upon  another.  "  It  is  use- 
less," he  says,  in  one  of  his  uncollected  papers,  "  to  judge  of  an 
artist  until  you  have  some  principles  in  the  art.  The  two  capital 
secrets  in  the  art  of  prose  composition  are  these :  ist,  The  philo- 
sophy of  transition  and  connection ;  2dly,  The  way  in  which  sen- 
tences are  made  to  modify  each  other  ;  for  the  most  powerful  effects 
in  written  eloquence  arise  out  of  this  reverberation,  as  it  were,  from 
each  other,  in  a  rapid  succession  of  sentences ;  and  because  some 
limitation  is  necessary  to  the  length  and  complexity  of  sentences, 
in  order  to  make  this  interdependency  felt :  hence  it  is  that  the 
Germans  have  no  eloquence."  These  "two  capital  secrets"  cor- 
respond very  much  with  Professor  Bain's  two  first  rules  of  the 
paragraph. 

I  have  examined  at  considerable  length  the  paragraph  arrange- 
ment of  ..Macajqky.  Very  few  writers  in  our  language  seem  to 
have  paid"*inuc'h  attention  to  the  construction  of  paragraphs. 
Macaulav  is  perhaps  the  most  exemplary.  Bacon  and  Temple, 
ITorritheir  legal  and  diplomatic  education,  are  much  more  meth- 
odical than  the  generality.  Johnson  is  also  entitled  to  praise. 
But  none  of  them  can  be  recommended  as  a  model 

FIGURES    OP    SPEECH. 

In  most  treatises  on  composition,  the  consideration  of  figurative 
language  occupies  a  large  space.  Of  the  small  portion  of  Aris- 
totle's Rhetoric  devoted  to  composition  purely,  it  constitutes  about 
one  half.  So  in  the  works  of  Campbell,  Kames,  and  Blair,  par- 
ticularly in  Kames's  '  Elements  of  Criticism,'  the  origin,  nature, 
limits,  minute  divisions,  the  uses  and  the  abuses  of  figures  of 
speech,  are  examined  and  exemplified  at  great  length.  And  yet 
these  later  writers  profess  to  be  much  more  concise  than  "  tha 


12  INTRODUCTION. 

ancient  critics  and  grammarians,"  and  to  have  discarded  many 
vexatiously  subtle  subdivisions. 

The  chief  thing  wanted  in  the  ancient  divisions  and  subdivisions 
was  some  broad  principle  of  classification.  This  is  supplied  by 
referring  figures  to  their  origin  in  the  operations  of  the  intellect. 
A  proper  basis  for  a  classification  is  found  in  the  ultimate  analysis 
of  these  operations.  When  the  classes  thus  instituted — Figures  of 
Similarity,  Figures  of  Contiguity,  and  Figures  of  Contrast — have 
gathered  up  all  the  figures  that  belong  to  them  respectively,  very 
lew  remain  unclassified.  Some  of  those  that  do  remain  are  dis- 
tinguished from  the  others  on  a  different  principle.  Such  figures 
as  interrogation,  exclamation,  and  apostrophe,  are  departures  from 
the  ordinary  structure  of  sentences,  and  thus  are  distinguished 
from  such  figures  as  are  departures  from  the  ordinary  application 
of  words.  According  to  the  distinction  of  the  old  grammarians, 
they  are  "  figures,"  as  distingushed  from  "  tropes."  So  much  for 
the  classification  of  figures.  It  is  not  quite  complete — it  leaves 
hyperbole,  climax,  innuendo,  and  irony  unclassified ;  but  it  is  a 
great  improvement  upon  the  old  chaos. 

The  truth  is,  that  the  subjects  included  in  books  of  composition 
under  the  head  of  Figures  of  Speech  do  not  admit  of  a  logical 
classification.  Under  that  head  rhetoricians  have  gradually  ac- 
cumulated all  artifices  of  style  that  do  not  belong  to  the  choice 
of  plain  words  and  the  structure  of  sentences.  Such  an  accumula- 
tion could  hardly  be  other  than  heterogeneous.1 

One  of  the  ancient  terms  it  might  be  well  to  revive  and  redefine 
in  accordance  with  its  derivation  and  original  application — namely, 
the  word  "  trope."  At  present,  when  used  at  all,  it  is  used  loosely 
as  a  kind  of  general  synonym  for  a  figure  of  speech.  By  Quintilian 
it  was  defined  as  an  opposite  to  the  term  figure — designating,  as 
we  have  just  seen,  extraordinary  applications  of  individual  words 
in  contrast  to  irregular  constructions  of  sentence.  Such  a  distinc- 
tion is  of  no  practical  value — it  would  be  useful  to  have  a  special 
term  for  irregular  constructions  of  sentence ;  but  it  would  be  im- 
possible to  restrict  the  word  figure  to  such  an  application.  Apart 
from  that,  the  word  trope  is  not  treated  with  much  delicacy  when 
set  up  as  an  expression  for  all  "  figures  of  speech  "  (in  the  wide 
sense),  except  irregular  constructions  of  sentenca  I  would  propose 
to  rescue  the  word  from  an  application  so  promiscuous,  and  to  settle 
it  in  its  original  application  as  a  name  for  a  much  narrower  class 
of  artifices. 

Interpreted  by  its  derivation,  trope  signifies  a  word  "  turned," 

1  Had  paragraph  structure  been  sooner  recognised,  the  so-called  figure  of 
speech,  ''climax,"  would  probably  have  been  referred  to  the  paragraph  as  a 
special  artifice  in  paragraph  construction.  Climax  is  no  more  a  figure  of  speech 
than  the  periodic,  the  balanced,  or  the  condensed  structure  of  sentence. 


ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE.  13 

diverted  from  its  ordinary  application,  and  pressed,  as  it  were,  into 
special  service.  Now  only  a  limited  number  of  figures  of  speech 
consist  in  this  extraordinary  use  of  single  words  ;  it  would  be  con- 
venient to  have  a  common  designation  for  them.  What  could  be 
more  proper  than  to  use  for  that  designation  the  existing  word 
trope  1 

To  vindicate  the  restriction  of  a  term  to  a  special  class  of  figures, 
even  wbon  that  restriction  is  warranted  by  the  derivation  of  the 
term,  we  must  show  that  occasions  arise  for  speaking  of  that  clasa 
of  figures  collectively.  In  this  case  such  a  vindication  is  easy. 
There  are_writerst  such  aq  J)^Onuicey.  who  use  comparatively  few 
formal  similitudes,  and  yet  use  metaphor,  personification,  synec- 
doche, or  metonymy,  in  almost  every  sentence.  On  the  other 
hand  there  are  writers,  such  as  Macaulay,  whose  diction  in  its 
general  texture  is  plain,  but  Avho  employ  a  great  many  formal 
similitudes.  Both  classes  of  writers  are  figurative,  but  the  one 
class  is  rich  in  tropes,  the  other  in  similes. 

The  want  of  such  a  word  as  trope,  thus  defined,  has  led  to  an 
abuse  of  the  word  metaphor  by  popular  writers.  Metaphor  has 
been  taken  to  supply  the  want.  In  strict  language,  metaphor 
means  a  similitude  implied  in  the  use  of  a  single  word,  without 
the  formal  sign  of  comparison  ;  but  it  is  often  loosely  used  as  a 
common  designation  for  synecdoches  and  metonymies  as  well. 
The  temptation  to  such  an  abuse  is  withdrawn  by  reviving  the 
original  meaning  of  the  word  tropa 

The  chief  points  that  we  shall  notice  under  Figures  of  Speech, 
besides  the  profusion  of  any  one  figure  or  class  of  figures,  are  the 
sources  of  similitudes  and  compliance  with  the  conditions  of  effec- 
tive comparison.  The  sources  of  an  author's  similitudes  are  often 
peculiarly  interesting,  as  affording  a  means  of  measuring  the  cir- 
cumference of  his  knowledge.  We  cannot,  to  be  sure,  by  such 
means,  take  a  very  accurate  measure,  but  we  can  tell  what  books 
a  man  has  dipped  into,  may  discover  what  writers  he  has  plagiar- 
ised from,  and  may  be  able  to  guess  how  his  interests  are  divided 
between  books  and  the  living  world.  What  casts  doubt  upon  our 
conclusions  is  the  fact  that  so  many  writers  are  similitude-hunters, 
are  very  often  on  the  watch  for  good  similitudes ;  and  the  conse- 
quent presumption  that  they  utilise  a  large  proportion  of  their 
knowledge.  Thomas  Fuller  is  one  of  the  most  versatile,  as  he  is 
one  of  the  most  delightful,  masters  of  allusion.  He  would  seem 
to  have  turned  almost  every  item  of  his  knowledge  to  account,  and 
thus  has  a  greater  appearance  of  learning  than  many  men  of  really 
profounder  erudition  and  wider  knowledge  of  the  world. 

The  conditions  of  effective  comparison  exhaust  all  that  can  be 
said  in  the  way  of  advice  concerning  the  use  of  figures.  When  a 
similitude  is  addressed  to  the  understanding — is  intended  merely 


14  INTRODUCTION. 

to  make  one's  meaning  more  perspicuous — care  must  be  taken  that 
the  point  of  the  comparison  be  clear,  that  there  be  no  distracting 
circumstances,  and  that  the  comparison  be  more  intelligible  to 
those  addressed  than  the  thing  compared.  When  a  similitude  is 
intended  to  elevate  or  to  debase  an  object  by  displaying  its  high 
or  its  low  relations,  care  must  be  taken  that  the  comparison  be,  in 
the  estimation  of  those  addressed,  really  higher  or  (as  the  case  may 
be)  lower  than  the  object ;  farther,  that  it  be  not  extravagantly  and 
offensively  out  of  level,  and  that  it  be  fresh.  These  are  the  main 
conditions  of  effective  comparison  for  purposes  of  exposition,  and 
for  persuasive  eulogy  or  ridicule.  In  comparisons  designed  only 
for  embellishment,  the  conditions  are  novelty  and  harmony,  or,  as 
it  might  also  be  called,  propriety.  As  regards  the  number  of 
figures  employed,  every  writer  must  be  guided  by  his  own  dis- 
cretion. The  critic  of  style  can  only  remark,  that  if  writers  were 
always  careful  to  make  their  comparisons  effective  for  a  purpose  of 
some  kind,  the  number  would  be  considerably  reduced. 

In  treating  of  an  author's  figures,  as  in  treating  of  his  vocabulary, 
we  might  anticipate  most  of  the  qualities  of  his  style.  Figures 
may  be  simple,  or  stirring,  or  grand,  or  touching,  or  witty,  or 
humorous.  A  full  account  of  a  man's  figurative  language  would 
display  nearly  all  his  characteristics. 

As  a  sort  of  postscript  to  the  Elements  of  Style,  we  may  easily 
define  the  mutual  relation  of  two  terms  often  used  in  contradis- 
tinction— MANNER  and  MATTER.  As  distinguished  from  matter, 
manner  includes  everything  that  we  h;ive  designated  by  the 
general  title  Elements  of  Style — not  only  the  choice  of  words 
and  the  structure  of  the  parts  of  a  discourse,  but  everything 
superinduced  upon  the  subject  of  discourse  by  way  either  of  com- 
parison or  of  contrast 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLE. 

The  division  of  qualities  into  purity,  perspicuity,  ornament,  pro- 
priety, is  open  to  the  objection  of  being  too  vague.  This  appears 
in  amendments  of  the  scheme  proposed  by  different  critics.  Home 
would  strike  off  "  propriety "  as  being  common  to  all  the  other 
qualities.  Others,  confining  propriety  to  the  choice  of  individual 
words,  would  retain  it  and  strike  off  "  purity  "  as  being  a  part  of  pro- 
priety thus  restricted.  Others  still  would  dispense  with  "ornament  " 
as  a  separate  division,  and  discuss  ornaments  under  perspicuity  and 
propriety.  And  Blair  maintains  that  "all  the  qualities  of  a  good 
style  may  be  ranged  under  two  heads,  perspicuity  and  ornament." 

Such  vague  fumbling  is  inevitable  so  long  as  qualities  of  style 
are  viewed  in  the  abstract,  and  without  reference  to  their  ends. 


QUALITIES   OF   STYLE.  15 

Campbell  was  the  first  to  suggest  a  substantial  principle  of  classi- 
fication by  considering  style  as  it  affects  the  mind  of  the  reader. 
His  analysis  is  not  perfect,  but  he  was  upon  the  right  track.  "  It 
appears,"  he  says,  "that  besides  purity,  which  is  a  quality  entirely 
grammatical,  the  five  simple  and  original  qualities  of  style,  con- 
sidered as  an  object  to  the  understanding,  the  imagination,  the  pas- 
sions, and  the  ear,  are  perspicuity,  vivacity,  elegance,  animation, 
and  music."  That  so  many  writers  on  composition  should  have 
fallen  back  from  this  comparatively  thorough  analysis  to  bad  ver- 
sions of  the  old  analysis,  is  not  much  to  their  credit 

One  of  the  causes  of  imperfection  in  Campbell's  analysis  was  his 
desire  to  separate  rigidly  between  the  effects  of  style  or  manner, 
and  the  effects  of  the  subject-matter.  This  cannot  be  done :  the 
manner  must  always  be  viewed  in  relation  to  the  matter.  In  order 
to  get  at  qualities  of  style,  we  must  first  make  an  analysis  of  the 
effects  of  a  composition  as  a  whole — matter  and  manner  together  ; 
not  till  then  are  we  in  a  position  to  consider  how  far  the  effect  is 
due  to  the  manner  and  how  far  to  the  matter.  For  example,  if  a 
composition  is  readily  intelligible,  we  consider  how  far  this  is  due 
to  the  familiarity  of  the  subject-matter,  and  how  far  to  the  author's 
treatment,  to  his  choice  and  arrangement  of  words,  and  to  his 
illustrations.  Nothing  could  be  more  absurd  than  Blair's  confi- 
dent assertion  that  the  difficulty  of  a  subject  can  never  be  pleaded 
as  an  excuse  for  want  of  perspicuity ;  that  if  an  author's  ideas  are 
clear,  he  should  always  be  able  to  make  them  perspicuous  to  others. 
Perspicuous,  as  Blair  understands  the  word,  means  easily  seen 
through ;  and  it  may  be  doubted  whether  any  powers  of  style 
could  make  the  generalisations  of  a  science  easily  and  immediately 
apparent  to  a  mind  not  familiar  with  the  particulars.  Style  can 
do  much,  but  it  has  a  limit  It  can  never  make  a  subject  natu- 
rally abstruse  as  easily  understood  as  a  subject  naturally  simple,  a 
treatise  on  Logic  as  perspicuous  as  a  statement  of  familiar  facts. 
So  with  compositions  that  address  the  feelings ;  the  master  of  style 
cannot  but  work  at  a  disadvantage  when  his  subject  is  not  natu- 
rally impressive. 

The  chief  aim  of  the  following  brief  remarks  on  Qualities  of 
Style  is  to  define  prevailing  critical  terms  as  closely  as  may  be 
with  reference  to  the  ultimate  analysis  here  adopted. 

INTELLECTUAL   QUALITIES   OP   STYLE- 
SIMPLICITY   AUD  CLEARNESS. 

Aristotle  recognises  but  one  intellectual  quality,  clearness.  The 
first  requisite  of  composition  is  that  it  be  clear.  So  Quintilian : 
"  The  first  virtue  of  eloquence  is  perspicuity."  In  Campbell's 
scheme,  also,  "  the  first  and  most  essential  of  the  qualities  of  style 
is  perspicuity." 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

Blair,  while  he  reduced  all  qualities  to  perspicuity  and  ornament, 
was  led,  in  his  consideration  of  perspicuity,  to  another  intellectual 
quality — namely,  precision.  He  described  precision  as  "  the  high- 
est part  of  the  quality  denoted  by  perspicuity,"  and  then  made  the 
following  contrast  between  precision  and  perspicuity  "  in  a  quali- 
fied sense."  "It  appears,"  he  said,  "that  an  author  may,  in  a 
qualified  sense,  be  perspicuous,  while  yet  he  is  far  from  being  pre- 
cise. He  uses  proper  words  and  proper  arrangements ;  he  gives 
you  the  idea  as  clear  as  he  conceives  it  himself, — and  so  far  he  is 
perspicuous :  but  the  ideas  are  not  very  clear  in  his  own  mind ; 
they  are  loose  and  general,  and  therefore  cannot  be  expressed  with 
precision.  All  subjects  do  not  equally  require  precision.  It  is 
sufficient,  on  many  occasions,  that  we  have  a  general  view  of  the 
meaning.  The  subject,  perhaps,  is  of  the  known  and  familiar 
kind ;  and  we  are  in  no  hazard  of  mistaking  the  sense  of  the  author, 
though  every  word  which  he  uses  be  not  precise  and  exact.  Few 
authors,  for  instance,  in  the  English  language,  are  more  clear  and 
perspicuous,  on  the  whole,  than  Archbishop  Tillotson  and  Sir  Wil- 
liam Temple ;  yet  neither  of  them  are  remarkable  for  precision." 

The  fact  is,  that  if  the  words  are  taken  in  their  ordinary  senses, 
precision  is  not  a  mode  of  perspicuity,  but  a  quality  in  some  meas- 
ure antagonistic  to  perspicuity.  Blair  might  have  drawn  a  line 
between  perspicuity  and  precision,  and  made  them  two  separate 
intellectual  qualities.  The  division  would  not  have  been  the  best, 
but  it  would  have  been  a  real  division,  and  better  than  none  at  all. 

Aristotle's  single  virtue  of  "  clearness  "  or  "  perspicuity  "  needs 
to  be  analysed  before  we  can  characterise  authors  with  discrimina- 
tion. We  need  two  broad  divisions,  simplicity  and  clearness,  and 
a  subdivision  of  clearness  into  general  clearness  and  minute  clear- 
ness. This  more  exact  division  I  shall  briefly  explain :  it  is  not 
arbitrary  dictatorial  sequestration  of  terms  to  unfamiliar  applica- 
tions, but  a  breaking  up  of  such  sequestrations,  and  a  reconciliation 
of  the  language  of  criticism  with  the  language  of  familiar  speech. 

When  designations  of  merit  are  loose  and  indeterminate,  they 
may  sometimes  be  cleared  up  by  a  reference  to  designations  of  de- 
merit. It  is  so  in  this  case.  What  are  the  faults  of  style  as  a  means 
of  communicating  knowledge  1  We  at  once  say  abstruseness  and 
confusion.  Keturning,  then,  to  the  positive  side,  we  ask  ourselves 
what  are  the  corresponding  merits — what  are  the  opposites  of 
abstruseness  and  confusion — and  we  have  no  difficulty  in  seeing 
that  the  main  intellectual  "virtues"  of  style  are  simplicity  and 
clearness. 

Simplicity  and  abstruseness  are  relative  terms.  Whatever  is 
hard  to  understand  is  not  simple,  is  abstruse,  recondite ;  and  what 
is  hard  for  one  man  may  be  easy  for  another.  The  phraseology  of 
natural  science  or  of  medicine  is  hard  to  the  unlearned  reader,  but 


QUALITIES  OF  STYLfl.  17 

easy  as  a  primer  to  the  naturalist  or  the  physician.  Abstract  terms 
are  generally  unpopular,  and  generally  disliked  as  dry,  bookish, 
scholastic  ;  yet  they  are  said  to  come  to  Scotchmen  more  naturally 
than  the  concrete  language  of  common  things.  Want  of  simpli- 
city is  not  an  absolute  fault ;  it  is  a  fault  only  in  relation  to  the 
persons  addressed.  A  writer  addressing  himself  purposely  to  a 
learned  audience  only  wastes  his  strength  by  beating  about  the 
bush  for  language  universally  familiar. 

Clearness,  as  opposed  to  confusion,  is  not  so  much  relative  to 
the  capacity  of  the  persons  addressed.  Ambiguous  language — 
words  so  arranged  as  to  convey  an  impression  different  from  what 
the  writer  intends,  may  mislead  learned  and  unlearned  alike.  Con- 
fused expression  is  not  justifiable  under  any  circumstances,  unless, 
indeed,  it  is  the  writer's  deliberate  purpose  to  mislead.  The  edu- 
cated reader  will  guess  the  meaning  sooner  than  the  uneducated ; 
but  neither  educated  nor  uneducated  should  be  burdened  with  the 
effort  of  guessing. 

Clearness,  as  we  have  said,  may  conveniently  be  subdivided  into 
general  clearness  and  minute  clearness  —  minute  clearness  being 
expressed  by  such  words  as  distinctness,  exactness,  precision.  There 
is  a  marked  line  of  separation  between  these  subdivisions.  Accu- 
racy in  the  general  outlines  is  a  different  thing  from  accuracy  in 
the  details.  In  truth,  the  two  are  somewhat  antagonistic.  To 
dwell  with  minute  precision  on  the  details  tends  rather  to  confuse 
our  impressions  as  to  the  general  outlines.  After  our  attention  has 
been  turned  to  minute  distinctions,  we  find  it  difficult  to  grasp  the 
mutual  relations  of  the  parts  so  distinguished  when  we  endeavour 
to  conceive  them  as  a  whole.  Again,  minute  distinctness  is  opposed 
to  simplicity.  The  general  outlines  of  things  can  be  conveyed  in 
familiar  language ;  but  when  we  desire  to  be  exact,  we  must  have 
recourse  to  terms  that  are  technical  and  unfamiliar.  To  say  that 
the  earth  is  "  round  "  is  a  sufficiently  clear  description  of  the  form 
of  the  earth  in  a  general  way — and  the  word  is  familiar  to  every- 
body ;  but  when  we  are  more  exact,  and  describe  the  earth  as  "  a 
sphere  flattened  at  the  poles."  we  remove  ourselves  from  the  easy 
comprehension  of  many  of  our  countrymen. 

We  are  now  in  a  better  position  to  discuss  the  critical  and  popu- 
lar use  of  the  word  perspicuity.  It  is  evident,  from  Campbell's 
account  of  the  faults  against  perspicuity,  that  he  understands  by 
the  term  a  certain  amount  of  clearness  combined  with  simplicity. 
He  includes  in  his  list  of  offences  not  only  confusion  of  thought, 
ambiguity — using  the  same  word  in  different  senses — and  uncer- 
tain reference  in  pronouns  and  relatives,  which  are  offences  against 
clearness,  but  also  technical  terms  and  long  sentences,  which  are 
offences  against  simplicity.  This  is  also  the  popular  use  of  the 
term.  Such  writers  as  Addison  and  Macaulay  are  said  to  be  per- 


18  INTRODUCTION. 

spicuous,  because  they  are  at  once  simple  or  easily  understood,  and 
free  from  obvious  confusion.  Their  ideas  are  expressed  in  popular 
language,  and  sufficiently  discriminated  for  popular  apprehension. 

Popularly,  therefore,  as  well  as  in  some  rhetorical  treatises,  per- 
spicuity stands  for  a  clear,  unambiguous,  unconfused  structure  of 
simple  language.  But  why  should  the  term  be  confined  to  a  clear 
structure  of  simple  language  1  We  can  easily  see  how  it  came  to 
be  so  confined.  A  general  reader  does  not  receive  clear  impres- 
sions from  a  work  couched  in  abstruse  language,  however  perspic- 
uous may  be  the  arrangement.  The  effort  of  realising  the  words 
is  too  much,  and  he  lets  them  slip  through  his  mind  vaguely. 
For  him  an  abstruse  style  cannot  be  perspicuous — simplicity  is 
indispensable  to  perspicuity.  But  while  we  see  how  the  word 
came  to  be  so  confined,  we  cannot  see  why  it  should  be  kept  so 
confined.  Johnson's  arrangement  is  clearer  and  more  free  from 
ambiguity  than  Addison's  or  Tillotson's.  Why  should  he  not  be 
called  a  perspicuous  writer  ? 

But  some  of  our  readers  will  say  that  Johnson  is  called  a  per- 
spicuous writer.  This  is  true,  but  he  is  not  so  by  Campbell's  defi- 
nition, for  he  uses  technical  terms  and  long  sentences ;  nor  is  he 
so  by  the  verdict  of  those  that  are  loosely  called  general  readers. 
He  is  called  perspicuous  because  his  words  are  apt  to  his  meaning, 
and  because  the  general  structure  of  his  discourses  is  clear.  His 
language  is  not  simple ;  he  is  not  perspicuous  if  simplicity  be  con- 
sidered a  part  of  perspicuity. 

Here,  therefore,  seems  to  arise  a  clash  between  the  general 
reader  and  the  reader  more  familiar  with  abstract  and  learned 
phraseology.  But  the  disagreement  is  more  apparent  than  real 
The  general  reader  applies  the  term  perspicuous  to  a  clear  choice 
and  construction  of  simple  language,  of  language  familiar  to  him; 
the  more  learned  reader  applies  the  term  to  a  clear  choice  and 
structure  of  language,  abstruse  perhaps  to  the  generality,  but  still 
familiar  to  him.  In  point  of  fact,  the  two  classes  of  readers  use 
the  word  perspicuous  with  the  same  meaning.  Both  have  in  view, 
not  the  familiarity  of  the  language  or  the  structure,  but  the  clear- 
ness of  it,  its  freedom  from  ambiguity  and  confusion.  The  intel- 
lectual qualities  of  such  writers  as  Tillotson,  Locke,  Addison, 
Macaulay,  are  not  fully  distinguished  by  the  single  word  perspic- 
uous— the  style  of  such  writers  is  perspicuous  and  simple.  John- 
eon  and  De_Quincey  are  also  perspicuous  in  their  choice  of  words^ 
and  in  their  general  structure ;  but  their  diction,  as  a  whole,  ia 
abstruse. 

We  said  a  little  ago  that  clearness  might  be  subdivided  into 
general  clearness  and  minute  clearness.  At  that  time  we  men- 
tioned no  single  word  for  general  clearness.  In  our  consideration 
of  the  word  perspicuity,  we  have  seen  that,  when  hunted  down  to 


QUALITIES  OF  STYLE.  19 

its  real  signification,  it  proves  to  be  the  very  word  required.  Per- 
spicuity, or  lucidity,  will  thus  stand  for  general  clearness,  unam- 
biguous, unconfused  structure — what  may  loosely  be  called  general 
accuracy  of  outline.  For  minute  accuracy,  careful  discrimination 
of  terms — demanding  from  the  reader  an  effort  to  make  sure  that 
his  ideas  are  not  vague,  but  rigidly  defined — we  have  the  terms 
precision,  exactness,  and  distinctness. 

A  distinct,  exact  writer  may  be  perspicuous ;  but,  as  we  have 
said,  he  runs  a  risk  of  not  being  so.  When  a  writer  is  scrupulously 
anxious  that  his  readers  understand  every  detail  exactly  as  he  con- 
ceives it,  there  is  a  danger  that  he  put  too  severe  a  strain  upon 
them,  and  confuse  their  comprehension  of  the  general  aspect  of  his 
theme.  jDe  Quincey  is  an  example  of  a  writer  at  once  exactan<l 
perspicuous  j^and  tne  secret  is,  that  ne  is  aware  of  his  danger,  and 
frequently  presses  upon  his  reader  a  general  view  of  what  he  is 
doing. 

Precision  and  simplicity  are  in  a  measure  antagonistic.  When 
Socrates  began  to  cross-examine  the  people  of  Athens,  he  found 
that  they  could  not  define  the  meaning  of  words  that  they  were 
using  every  day.  They  used  language  in  a  loose  way  for  purposes 
of  social  intercourse,  and  did  not  trouble  themselves  to  be  rigidly 
exact.  The  case  is  not  much  altered  among  us.  A  very  exact 
writer  cannot  but  be  abstruse  to  the  generality. 

->j 

EMOTIONAL   QUALITIES   OF   STYLE— STRENGTH, 
PATHOS,   THE   LUDICROUS. 

The  emotional  qualities  of  style  are  not  so  difficult  to  distinguish 
as  the  intellectual  qualities.  Had  Campbell  not  been  needlessly 
anxious  to  isolate  the  style  from  the  subject-matter,  he  would 
never  have  thought  of  huddling  together  all  the  emotional  quali- 
ties under  the  name  of  vivacity.1  There  are  three  broadly  dis- 
tinguished emotional  qualities  —  strength,  pathos,  and  the  ludi- 
crous ;  and  each  of  these  is  a  general  name  for  distinct  varieties. 

Under  the  general  name  of  Strength  are  embraced  such'varieties 
as  animation,  vivacity,  liveliness,  rapidity,  brilliancy ;  nerve, 
vigour,  force,  energy,  fervour;  dignity,  stateliness,  splendour, 
grandeur,  magnificence,  loftiness,  sublimity. 

Between  the  extremes  in  the  list — animation  and  sublimity — 
there  is  a  wide  difference ;  yet  sublimity  is  more  appropriately 
classed  with  animation  than  with  any  mode  of  pathos.  So  with 
rapidity  and  dignity.  The  contrast  between  strength  and  pathos 

1  Longinns's  celebrated  treatise  irepi  ityovs,  mistranslated  "On  the  Sublime" 
through  the  Latin  De  Sublimitate,  falls  into  the  same  excess  of  abstraction. 
Hypsos,  according  to  De  Quincey,  means  everything  tending  to  elevate  compo- 
sition above  commonplace. 


20  INTRODUCTION. 

is  as  the  contrast  between  motion  and  rest.  The  effect  of  a  calm, 
sustained  motion  is  nearer  to  the  effect  of  absolute  repose  than  it 
is  to  the  effect  of  a  restless,  rapid,  abrupt  motion ;  yet  the  calm, 
sustained  motion  is  considered  as  a  state  of  motion,  and  not  as  a 
state  of  rest.  In  like  manner,  an  overpowering  sense  of  sublimity 
approaches  nearer  to  a  sense  of  depression  and  melancholy  than 
it  does  to  animation  or  vivacity ;  yet  it  is  essentially  a  mode  of 
strength,  and  not  a  mode  of  pathos. 

In  the  above  list  I  have  attempted  some  kind  of  subordinate 
division,  throwing  together  the  terms  that  seem  more  nearly  syn- 
onymous. It  would  not  be  possible  to  define  them  exactly  without 
incurring  the  charge  of  making  one's  own  feelings  the  standard  for 
all  men.  The  terms  are  used  with  considerable  latitude,  partly 
because  few  people  take  the  trouble  to  weigh  their  words,  but 
partly  also  because  different  men  have  different  ideals  of  animation, 
different  ideals  of  energy,  different  ideals  of  sublimity.  All  can 
understand,  upon  due  reflection,  the  common  bond  between  these 
qualities — their  common  difference  from  the  qualities  comprehended 
under  pathos  ;  but  no  amount  of  explanation  can  give  two  men  of 
different  character  the  same  ideas  of  animation,  energy,  dignity,  or 
sublimity.  The  utmost  that  explanation  can  do  is  to  disabuse 
their  minds  of  the  idea  that  the  one  is  wrong  and  the  other  right, 
and  to  persuade  them  that  they  are  simply  at  variance.  At  the 
same  time,  the  application  of  the  terms  is  not  absolutely  chaotic. 
Take  the  universal  suffrage,  and  you  find  a  considerable  body  of 
substantial  agreement  between  the  loose  borders. 

One  great  cause  of  the  licentious  abuse  of  these  terms  is  the 
desire  of  admirers  to  credit  their  favourites  with  every  excellence 
of  style.  Could  we  subtract  all  the  abuses  committed  under  this 
impulse,  we  should  find  the  popular  applications  of  terms  very 
much  at  one.  All  agree  in  describing  Macaulay  as  animated, 
rapid,  and  brilliant.  There  is  not  so  much  unanimity  in  accredit- 
ing him  with  dignity  —  at  least  with  dignity  of  the  highest  de- 
gree ;  and  he  is  seldom  credited  with  sublimity.  Headers  would 
probably  be  no  less  unanimous  in  calling  Jeremy  Taylor  fervid, 
Dry  den  energetic,  Temple  dignified,  Defoe  nervous,  Johnson  vigor- 
ous, Burke  splendid,  and  De  Quincey's  "  prose  fantasies  "  sublime. 

Perhaps  none  of  the  above  words  are  so  shifting  in  their  appli- 
cation as  the  \vord  sublimity.  In  an  account  of  De  Quincey's 
character  I  have  tried  to  distinguish  two  opposite  modes  of  sub- 
limity. No  critical  term  is  more  in  need  of  definition.  De  Quin- 
cey  denies  it  of  Homer,  and  ascribes  it  in  the  highest  degree  to 
Milton,  seeming  to  understand  by  it  the  exhibiting  of  vast  power 
to  adoring  contemplation. 

Pathos  is  contrasted  with  the  sentiment  of  power,  and  is  said  to 


QUALITIES   OF   STYLE.  21 

be  "allied  to  inaction,  repose,  and  the  passive  side  of  our  nature." 
According  to  this  definition,  whatever  excites  or  agitates  is  not 
pathetic. 

This  distinction,  like  every  attempt  at  analysis  of  mental  states, 
is  open  to  endless  dispute.  It  will  be  almost  unanimously  allowed 
as  regards  tender  feelings  awakened  by  the  representation  of 
"  objects  of  special  affection,  displays  of  active  goodness,  humane 
sentiments,  and  gentle  pleasures."  But  it  may  stagger  many  as 
applied  to  the  representations  of  pain  and  misery.  Are  these  not 
agitating  1  and  are  they  not  justly  called  pathetic? 

To  answer  all  conceivable  difficulties  in  the  way  of  understand- 
ing the  above  definition  of  pathos  would  be  hopeless  within  our 
present  limits.  It  may  remove  some  difficulties  to  remind  the 
reader  that  we  have  here  to  do  not  with  tender  feeling  as  awak- 
ened by  actual  objects,  but  with  tender  feeling  as  awakened  by 
verbal  representations.  Pathos,  as  here  discussed,  is  the  quality 
of  a  style  that  awakens  tender  feelings — not  another  name  for 
tender  feeling  as  it  arises  in  actual  life.  I  do  not  mean  that  the 
feelings  arising  from  these  two  sources  differ  otherwise  than  in 
degree ;  I  mean  only  that  the  reality  is  usually  more  agitating 
than  the  verbal  representation.  The  report  of  a  railway  accident 
may  be  read  with  a  certain  luxurious  horror  by  a  delicate  person, 
whom  the  actual  sight  would  throw  into  fits. 

But  still  the  question  returns,  Are  not  verbal  representations 
of  pain  and  misery  often  agitating  1  The  answer  to  this  question 
is,  that  not  every  representation  of  pain  and  misery  is  pathetic. 

To  speak  technically,  there  are  two  different  uses  of  painful 
scenes  in  composition — the  description  of  misery  is  adapted  to 
two  distinct  ends.  These  may  be  defined,  with  sufficient  accu- 
racy, as  the  persuasive  end  and  the  poetic  end.  When  a  writer 
or  a  speaker  wishes,  by  a  painful  description  or  a  painful  story, 
to  persuade  to  a  course  of  action,  he  dwells  upon  the  particulars 
'that  agitate  and  excite.  A  pleader  wishing  to  excite  pity  for 
his  client,  so  as  to  procure  acquittal,  dwells  upon  the  harrowing 
side  of  the  case — the  destitution  of  the  man's  family,  and  such- 
like. He  does  not  cater  for  the  pleasure  of  the  jurors,  but  does 
his  best  to  make  them  uncomfortable.  So  the  preacher  of  a 
charity  sermon,  if  he  wishes  to  draw  contributions  from  hia 
audience,  must  not  throw  a  sentimental  halo  over  the  miseries 
of  the  poor,  but  must  drag  into  prominence  hunger,  dirt,  and 
nakedness,  in  their  most  repulsive  aspects,  horrifying  his  hearers 
with  pictures  that  haunt  them  until  they  have  done  their  utmost 
*o  relieve  the  sufferers.  Very  different  is  ,the  end  of  the  poet 
His  object  is  to  throw  his  reader  into  a  pleasing  melancholy.  He 
withholds  from  his  picture  of  distress  all  disgusting  and  exciting 
circumstances,  reconciles  us  to  the  pain  by  dwelling  upon  its 


22  INTEODUCTION. 

alleviations,  represents  misery  as  the  inevitable  lot  of  man,  ex- 
hibits the  authors  of  misery  as  visited  with  condign  punishment, 
expresses  impassioned  sympathy  with  the  unfortunate  victims. 
By  some  artifice  or  other — I  have  mentioned  only  a  few  for  illus- 
tration— he  contrives  to  make  us  acquiesce  in  the  existence  of  the 
misery  represented.  He  has  failed  in  his  end  if  he  leaves  us  dis- 
satisfied and  uncomfortable,  because  the  misery  was  not  relieved 
or  cannot  be  relieved  now.  If  we  are  not  reconciled  to  the  ex- 
istence of  the  misery,  disposed  simply  to  mourn  over  it  and  be 
content,  the  composition  is  not  pathetic,  but  painful.  For  this 
luxurious  treatment  of  painful  things  the  poet  is  often  heavily 
censured  by  the  preacher.  Sterne's  '  Sentimental  Journey '  was 
reprobated  by  Robert  Hall ;  and  in  our  own  day  we  are  familiar 
with  Carlyle's  denunciation  of  "whining,  puling,  sickly  senti- 
mentality." 

To  this  distinction  between  the  painful  end  of  persuasion  and 
the  pathetic  end  of  poetry,  we  may  add  a  little  by  way  of  antici- 
pating the  more  obvious  objections. 

It  will  be  said  that  a  preacher's  object  is  to  persuade  people  to 
action,  and  yet  that  sermons  are  often  called  pathetic.  This  fact 
need  not  disturb  our  definition.  For,  i°,  While  it  is  (me  of  a 
preacher's  objects  to  persuade  to  action,  it  is  not  his  only  object : 
the  pulpit  has  also  a  function  of  consolation — and  consolation,  the 
reconciling  of  people  to  their  miseries,  is  by  our  definition  essen- 
tially pathetic.  2°,  Supposing  a  sermon  admirably  adapted  to  set 
beneficence  in  motion — supposing  it  to  present  a  picture  of  most 
harrowing  distress — the  hearers  cannot  take  measures  for  relief 
at  once ;  and  meantime,  if  not  so  excited  as  to  be  thoroughly 
uncomfortable,  they  may  indulge  in  pathetic  dreams  of  the  relief 
that  they  intend  to  give.  3°,  The  effect  of  a  composition  depends 
very  much  upon  the  recipient — a  tale  of  woe  that  makes  one  man 
uncomfortable  for  days,  may  supply  another  with  a  luxurious  feast 
of  mournful  sentiment.  It  is  chiefly  this  last  consideration  that 
makes  the  application  of  the  term  pathos  shifting — that  causes  tho 
difficulty  of  drawing  any  "objective"  line  between  pathos  and 
horror.  Few  persons  skilled  in  analysing  their  feelings  would 
'  object  to  the  above  definition  of  pathos,  but  there  would  be  con- 
siderable difference  of  opinion  as  to  what  is  agitating  or  horrible 
and  what  is  truly  pathetic. 

Again,  it  may  be  said  that  a  tragic  poem  is  agitating,  and  yet 
that  it  is  pathetic.  To  which  we  answer  that  in  a  tragedy,  while 
isolated  scenes  are  tempestuously  agitating,  the  effect  may  yet  be 
pathetic  on  the  whole.  Tragedy  "  purifies  the  mind  by  pity  and 
terror ; "  the  atmosphere  is  shaken  with  tempests,  only  to  subside  at 
the  end  into  a  purer  and  more  perfect  calm.  Painful  incidents, 
thrilling  transports  of  grief,  keep  alive  our  interest  in  the  plot : 


QUALITIES   OF  STYLE.  23 

we  do  not  see  the  pathetic  side  of  these  painful  representations 
till  we  look  back  upon  them  from  the  repose  of  the  conclusion. 

I  need  not  dwell  on  the  terms  for  varieties  of  the  Ludicrous. 
The  only  nicety  is  the  distinction  between  wit  and  humour. 
Much  has  been  written  on  this  distinction.  One  can  see,  from 
the  examples  quoted,  that  critics  are  very  much  at  one,  though 
they  generally  fail  in  definition,  owing  to  the  vagueness  of  their 
psychological  language.  Professor  Bain's  theory  is  that  humour 
is  simply  the  laughable  degradation  of  an  object  without  malice, 
in  a  genial,  kindly,  good-natured  way ;  and  that  vrit  is  "  an  in- 
genious and  unexpected  play  upon*  words."  The  two  qualities 
are  not  opposed,  not  incompatible.  A  good  deal  of  the  confusion 
about  them  has  arisen  from  viewing  them  as  two  contrasted  and 
inconsistent  qualities.  Wit  may  be  humorous,  or  it  may  be 
derisive,  malicious.  I  have  somewhere  seen  it  laid  down  that 
humour  "  involves  an  element  of  the  subjectiva"  When  we  call 
a  writer  humorous,  we  have  regard  to  the  spirit  of  his  ludicrous 
degradation  ;  we  imply  that  he  is  good-natured — that  he  bears  no 
malice.  When  we  call  a  writer  witty,  we  have  regard  simply  to 
the  cleverness  of  his  expression ;  he  may  be  sarcastic,  like  Swift 
— or  humorous,  like  Steele.  The  proper  antithesis  to  humour  is 
satire :  wit  is  common  to  both. 

Such  is  the  true  definition  of  humour,  but  in  the  actual  applica- 
tion there  may  be  as  much  inconstancy  as  in  the  application  of  the 
term  pathos,  and  from  the  same  reason.  What  appears  kindly  and 
good-natured  to  one  man,  may  not  appear  so  to  another.  Addison 
is  generally  classed  among  the  humourists ;  yet  only  the  other  day 
his  kindliness  was  described  as  an  affectation  put  on  to  sharpen  the 
sting  of  his  ridicule.  Johnson  spoke  of  his  "malevolent  wit  and 
humorous  sarcasm  "  ;  and  the  present  writer  believes  that  it  would 
be  difficult  to  find,  among  all  Addison's  papers,  half-a-dozen  in 
which  the  wit  may  not  fairly  be  characterised  as  malicious.  He 
is  a  humourist  to  us,  but  he  could  hardly  have  appeared  a  humour- 
ist to  his  victims. 

There  is  another  cause  of  difference  among  critics  as  respects 
particular  compositions.  A  reader  may  refuse  to  acknowledge  a 
degradation,  however  comical.  He  may  view  an  object  too  seri- 
ously to  allow  that  it  should  be  trifled  with.  A  recent  critic 
professes  himself  blind  to  the  humour  of  De  Quincey,  and  sees 
in  his  playful  liberties  with  distinguished  names  nothing  but 
frivolous  impertinence.  In  all  such  cases,  as  De  Quincey  him- 
self says,  "not  to  sympathise  is  not  to  understand," 


•24  INTRODUCTION. 

ELEGANCIES   OF   STYLE-MELODY,   HARMONY", 
TASTE. 

"  In  the  harmony  of  periods,"  says  Blair,  "  two  things  may  be 
considered.  First,  agreeable  sound,  or  modulation  in  general  with- 
out any  particular  expression.  Next,  the  sound  so  ordered  as  to 
become  expressive  of  the  sense." 

Instead  of  expressing  qualities  so  different  by  a  single  term,  it 
is  better  to  provide  a  term  for  each.  In  accordance  with  the 
acceptation  of  melody  and  harmony  in  the  vocabulary  of  music, 
we  may  describe  "  agreeable  s_ound  or  modulation  in  general "  as 
Melody,  and  "  the  sound  so  ordered  as  to  become  expressive  of  the 
sense  "  as  Harmony.  If  a  single  designation  is  wanted  for  the  two 
qualities  together,  we  may,  agreeably  to  Campbell's  list  of  quali- 
ties, call  them  the  music  of  composition. 

Under  Melody  there  are  two  things  that  we  may  consider. 
First,  whether  an  author  conforms  to  the  general  laws  of  melody, 
— the  avoiding  of  harsh  effects  ;  the  alternation  of  long  and  short, 
emphatic  and  unemphatic  syllables ;  the  alternation  of  conson- 
ants among  themselves,  and  vowels  among  themselves;  the  avoid- 
ing of  unpleasant  alliterations  ;  the  cadence  at  the  close.  Second, 
what  is  his  prevailing  rhythm,  tune  or  strain,  and  how  far  this  is 
varied. 

To  examine  how  far  an  author  observes  the  general  rules  of 
melody  would  be  a  good  school  exercise.  It  is  not  easy  to  give 
an  idea  of  an  author's  favourite  strain.  The  only  means  open  to 
us  is  to  produce  characteristic  specimens.  We  have  as  yet  no 
scheme  of  nomenclature  or  notation  for  describing  it  technically. 

Some  writers,  perhaps  the  majority,  can  impart  no  characteristic 
swing  to  their  language — either  having  no  natural  preference  for  a 
particular  rhythm,  or  giving  their  whole  attention  to  the  expres- 
sion of  the  meaning,  or  being  overruled  by  habitual  combinations. 
Only  such  as  have,  first,  a  decided  ear  for  effects  of  cadence,  and, 
secondly,  a  copious  choice  of  words,  can  attain  to  a  melody  that 
shall  be  either  characteristic  or  effective. 

As  regards  Harmony.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  harmony,  or 
adaptation  of  sound  to  sense,  even  in  prose.  At  the  same  time, 
change  of  strain  or  movement  to  suit  change  of  theme  is  not  so 
marked  in  prose  as  in  poetry,  and  for  a  very  obvious  reason.  The 
writer  of  verse  can  suit  himself  to  variations  of  feeling  by  choice 
of  metre,  but  the  writer  of  prose  has  no  such  fixed  steps  to  help 
him  to  vary  his  pace.  Besides,  the  prose  writer's  habits  of  con- 
struction are  accommodated  to  his  prevailing  rhythm  ;  the  phrases 
that  most  readily  occur  to  him  are  in  pace  with  this  rhythm, — so 
that,  along  with  a  greater  difficulty  than  the  verse  writer  in  chang- 
ing his  pace,  owing  to  the  want  of  a  standard  metre,  he  has  a 


QUALITIES   OF  STYLE.  25 

farther  difficulty  that  besets  none  but  verse  writers  accustomed 
only  to  one  metre. 

Accordingly,  we  find  that  prose  writers  having  a  characteristic 
rhythm,  can  vary  it  but  slightly  to  harmonise  with  the  subject- 
matter. 

The  word  taste  is  used  in  two  different  senses ;  and  when  we 
meet  with  the  word,  and  are  disposed  to  challenge  its  application, 
we  do  well  to  make  sure  in  which  signification  our  author  employs 
it.  In  its  widest  sense  it  is  equivalent  to  artistic  sensibility — as 
Blair  defines  it,  "  the  power  of  receiying  pleasure  from  the  beauties 
of  nature  and  of  art."  In  its  narrower  sense  it  may  be  expressed 
as  artistic  judgment,  being  identical  with  what  Blair  and  others 
define  as  "  delicacy  "  and  "  correctness  "  of  taste.  By  writers  of 
the  present  day  the  word  seems  to  be  generally  used  in  the  nar- 
rower sense ;  and  in  this  sense  it  is  used  in  the  following  work. 

As  regards  what  artistic  judgment  is  there  may  be  wide  differ- 
ences of  opinion.  Many  men,  many  tastes  ;  one  man's  liking  may 
be  another  man's  loathing.  Still,  when  all  has  been  said  that  can 
be  said  concerning  differences  of  taste,  it  cannot  be  denied  that 
there  is  a  considerable  body  of  agreement  To  take  the  elements 
of  style  separately.  There  is  a  tolerably  unanimous  public  opinion 
against  interlarding  English  composition  with  foreign  words  or 
idioms,  Latin,  French,  or  German;  against  needless  coining  of  new 
words;  and  against  setting  up  of  unidiomatic  combinations.  No 
writer  could  make  an  excessive  use  of  any  artifice  of  construction 
— balanced  sentences,  short  sentences,  condensed  sentences,  abrupt 
and  startling  transitions — without  incurring  general  censure.  So 
as  regards  figures  of  speech  :  a  style  too  ornate,  too  hyperbolical, 
too  declamatory,  is  condemned  as  such  by  the  critics  with  very 
considerable  unanimity.  Marked  abuses  of  the  elements  of  style 
are  very  generally  recognised  as  abuses.  To  be  sure,  if  a  writer  is 
otherwise  fresh  and  vigorous,  all  read  him  ;  and  even  fastidious 
critics  wink  at  his  eccentricities  as  an  agreeable  break  in  the 
general  monotony  of  composition ;  but  few  venture  to  hold  up  his 
eccentricities  for  general  imitation. 

Concerning  the  emotional  qualities  of  style  we  find  much  less 
agreement.  There  are  always  a  few  of  wider  literary  knowledge 
and  superior  discernment  who  groan  inwardly,  some  of  them  out- 
wardly, at  the  judgment  of  the  multitude  in  the  matter  of  sub- 
limity, pathos,  and  humour.  And  these  apart,  writers  and  their 
admirers  separate  naturally  into  different  schools.  Taste  "  varies 
with  the  emotional  constitution,  the  intellectual  tendencies,  and 
the  education  of  each  individual.  A  person  of  strong  tender  feel- 
ings is  not  easily  offended  by  the  iteration  of  pathetic  images  ;  the 
sense  of  the  ludicrous  and  of  humour  is  in  many  cases  entirely 


26  INTRODUCTION. 

wanting ;  and  the  strength  of  humane  and  moral  sentiment  may 
be  such  as  to  recoil  from  inflicting  ludicrous  degradation.  A  mind 
bent  ou  the  pursuit  of  truth  views  with  distaste  the  exaggerations 
of  th«  poetL  art  Each  person  is  by  education  attached  more  to 
one  school  or  class  of  writers  than  to  another." 

KINDS  OF  COMPOSITION. 

Five  "  kinds  of  composition  "  are  set  down  in  Bain's  Rhetoric — 
description,  narration,  exposition,  persuasion,  poetry.1  Each  of 
these  kinds  has  a  special  method,  a  special  body  of  rules.  The 
student  who  has  mastered  everything  that  has  been  given  under 
the  "  Elements  "  and  the  "  Qualities  "  of  style,  has  still  something 
to  learn. 

We  have  already  remarked  that  the  three  divisions  adopted  in 
this  work  are  distinguished  not  as  separate  component  parts,  but 
only  as  different  aspects  or  different  ways  of  approach.  We  have 
said  that  under  either  the  "Elements  of  Style,"  the  "  Qualities  of 
Style,"  or  the  "  Kinds  of  Composition,"  a  complete  survey  might 
be  taken  of  all  the  arts  of  style.  When  we  come  to  consider  the 
kinds  of  composition,  we  see  that  this  remark  needs  a  farther 
limitation.  The  kinds  of  composition  may  be  subdivided,  and 
under  each  of  the  subdivisions  might  be  included  a  complete  survey 
of  the  arts  of  style.  Every  precept  of  style  laid  down  under  the 
"  Elements  "  and  the  "  Qualities  "  might  be  repeated  under  De- 
scription, Narration,  and  Exposition.  Whoever  wishes  to  describe 
well,  narrate  well,  and  expound  well,  would  be  all  the  better  for 
knowing  every  good  advice  that  can  be  given  in  the  departments 
prior  in  the  order  of  our  sketch.  Persuasion,  again,  embraces 
everything  prior  to  it  There  is  no  precept  of  style  that  may  not 
be  useful  to  the  orator  or  the  persuasive  writer.  "  Rhetoric  "  is 
another  name  for  the  whole  art  of  composition. 

DESCRIPTION,  NARRATION,  EXPOSITION. 

These  three  kinds  of  composition  may  be  roughly  distinguished  * 
as  follows :  Description  embraces  all  the  means  of  representing 
in  words  particular  "  objects  of  consciousness,"  whether  external 
things  or  states  of  mind  ;  narration,  all  the  means  of  representing 
particular  sequences  of  events ;  exposition,  all  the  means  of  repre- 
senting general  propositions.  These  may  be  taken  as  rough  defi- 
nitions of  them  in  their  elemental  purity ;  in  actual  composition 
they  are  almost  always  mixed. 

For  the  simplest  forms  of  description,  narration,  and  exposition, 
special  rules  would  be  of  no  practical  use — would  be  affected  and 
superfluous.  It  is  only  in  the  more  complicated  and  difficult  forms 

1  The  design  of  the  present  work  excludes  Poetry,  both  with  and  without  the 
accompaniment  of  metre. 


KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION.  ,  27 

that  precepts  become  of  service,  and  then  they  may  be  said  to  be 
indispensable. 

The  main  difficulty  in  description  arises  "when  we  have  to 
describe  a  varied  scene — the  array  of  a  battle,  a  town,  a  prospect, 
the  exterior  or  interior  of  a  building,  a  piece  of  machinery,  the 
geography  of  a  country,  the  structure  of  a  plant  or  an  animal." 
It  is  to  this  difficulty  that  the  special  rules  of  description  apply. 
Burke  and  Macaulay  are  often  said  to  possess  great  descriptive 
power.  But,  as  we  shall  see,  this  can  mean  only  that  they  present 
with  vividness  the  individual  particulars  or  striking  aspects  of  a 
scene.  Neither  of  them  possesses  great  descriptive  method.  Carlyle 
may  be  said  to  have  raised  the  standard  of  descriptive  method ; 
Alison  also,  and  later  Mr  Kinglake,  are  very  studied  in  their 
descriptions. 

The  principles  of  description,  as  stated  in  Bain's  Khetoric,  are 
perhaps  the  best  defined  and  the  least  liable  to  exception  of  all 
precepts  relating  to  composition.  No  person  can  describe  a  com- 
plicated scene  well  without  consciously  or  unconsciously  satisfying 
these  conditions  ;  and  a  person  with  a  moderate  command  of  lan- 
guage, by  adhering  to  these  conditions,  will  surpass — at  least  as 
regards  the  first  essential  of  drawing  a  clear  picture — the  undisci- 
plined efforts  of  very  high  genius. 

No  such  exactness  of  plan  is  attainable  for  the  narration  of 
complicated  events.  Still,  it  is  possible  to  point  out  to  the  his- 
torian his  chief  liabilities  to  confusion,  and  put  him  so  far  upon 
his  guard. 

We  defined  the  fundamental  idea  of  narration  as  being  the  repre- 
sentation of 'particular  sequences  of  events.  But  History  in  its 
actual  development  is  a  much  more  complex  affair.  De  Quincey 
recognises  three  modes  of  history :  Narrative  (a  record  of  public 
transactions) ;  Scenical  (a  study  of  picturesque  effects) ;  and  Philo- 
sophical (a  reasoned  explanation  of  events).  These  are  real  dis- 
tinctions, and  we  are  not  sure  that  they  might  not  be  multiplied. 
Not  that  extant  histories  may  be  divided  into  these  three  classes 
— such  a  work  as  Macaulay's  '  History  of  England '  attempts  to 
combine  the  three  modes — but  these  distinctions  point  to  three 
different  functions  of  History.  The  historian  may  simply  record 
public  transactions  without  attempting  to  explain  them  or  draw 
lessons  from  them,  and  without  any  effort  to  describe  splendid 
spectacles  or  interesting  incidents.  He  may  give  his  principal  care 
to  making  the  record  of  events  instructive,  may  have  a  studious 
eye  to  the  lessons  of  political  and  social  wisdom,  or  he  may  give 
his  principal  care  to  making  the  record  of  events  scenically  or 
dramatically  interesting.  Now,  without  saying  that  these  three 
functions  should  be  kept  distinct — that  a  history  should  be  either 
plainly  narrative,  or  philosophical,  or  scenical,  and  should  not 


28  INTRODUCTION. 

aspire  to  be  all  three  at  once — there  is  an  advantage  in  considering 
a  history  under  these  three  aspects  separately.  We  observe  first 
by  what  arts  the  historian  makes  his  narrative  simple  and  per- 
spicuous— whether  he  follows  the  order  of  events,  where  and  with 
what  justification  he  departs  from  that  order,  what  provision  he 
makes  for  keeping  distinct  in  our  minds  the  several  concurring 
streams  of  events  in  complicated  transactions,  what  skill  he  shows 
in  the  construction  of  summaries,  and  other  minor  points.  His 
skill  in  explaining  events  by  general  principles,  and  in  deducing 
general  lessons,  forms  a  separate  consideration.  And  still  another 
consideration  is  his  scenical  and  dramatic  skill ;  his  word-painting, 
plot-arrangement,  and  other  points  of  artistic  treatment. 

Apart  from  the  objects  of  critical  remark  thus  grouped  together 
may  be  placed,  as  a  thing  for  special  consideration,  the  particular 
form  of  historical  chapter  or  book  that  undertakes  to  delineate  the 
whole  social  state  of  a  people  at  some  one  epoch.  The  most  cele- 
brated example  of  this  is  the  third  chapter  of  Macaulay's  History. 

For  the  statement  of  simple  generalities,  presenting  no  difficulty 
to  the  apprehension  of  the  reader,  little  direction  can  be  given. 
The  rules  of  exposition  apply  only  to  the  more  abstruse  gener- 
alities. The  four  leading  arts  of  statement  and  illustration  are 
iteration,  obverse  iteration,  exemplification,  and  comparison.  The 
popular  expositor  must  also  study  the  arts  of  imparting  interest  to 
dry  subjects,  and  must  learn  to  appreciate  the  difficulties  of  the 
tyro,  and  to  take  every  advantage  of  the  previous  knowledge  of  his 
readers. 

The  arts  of  PERSUASION,  rhetoric  proper,  open  up  a  still  wider 
field.  We  have  said  that  all  the  arts  of  style  are  of  service  to  the 
orator.  There  are  times,  perhaps,  when  the  speaker  may  choose  to 
set  the  precepts  of  clear  expression  on  one  side.  Instead  of  trying 
to  express  himself  clearly,  he  may  seek  to  mislead  and  cheat  his 
audience  with  studied  ambiguity;  but  he  will  do  this  all  the 
better  if  he  is  able,  upon  occasion,  to  express  himself  clearly  and 
attractively. 

The  principal  things  to  attend  to  in  criticising  oratory  are  the 
orator's  knowledge  and  power  of  adapting  himself  to  the  persons 
addressed,  his  verbal  ingenuity  as  shown  in  happy  turns  of  expres- 
sion, his  argumentative  power,  and  his  skill  in  playing  upon  special 
emotions. 

In  the  examination  of  the  leading  authors,  we  follow  the  order 
of  this  introductory  sketch.  We  do  not  take  up,  in  the  case  of 
every  author,  every  point  here  mentioned ;  we  remark  only  upon 
the  prominent  features  in  each  individual  case ;  but  we  take  up 
the  various  points  in  the  order  of  our  preliminary  analysis. 


PART    L 


DE    QUINCEY.        MACAULAY. 
CARLYLE. 


CHAPTER    I 


THOMAS     DE     QUINCEY, 

1785—1859. 

AMONG  the  most  eminent  prose  writers  of  this  century  is  Thomas 
de  Quincey,  best  known  as  The  English  Opiums-Eater. 

The  family  of  De  Quiucey,  as  we  learn  from  this  its  most  famous 
modern  representative,  was  originally  Norwegian,  played  a  distin- 
guished part  in  the  Norman  Conquest,  and  flourished  through  nine 
or  ten  generations  as  one  of  the  houses  of  nobility,  until  its  head, 
the  Earl  of  Winchester,  was  attainted  for  treason.  For  more  than 
a  century  before  the  birth  of  the  "  Opium-Eater,"  none  .of  his  name 
had  borne  a  title  of  high  rank.  His  father  was  an  opulent  mer- 
chant in  Manchester,  who  died  young,  leaving  his  widow  a  fortune 
of  ;£i6oo  a-year. 

We  know  the  particulars  of  the  earlier  part  of  De  Quincey's  life 
from  his  '  Confessions  of  an  Opium-Eater,'  and  his  '  Autobiographic 
Sketches.'  The  fifth  son  of  a  family  of  eight,  he  was  born  on  the 
i5th  of  August  1785,  at  Greenhay,  then  an  isolated  house  about  a 
mile  from  Manchester.  He  has  recorded  his  earliest  recollections ; 
and  he  was  so  precocious,  that  these  date  from  the  middle  of  his 
second  year.  His  autobiography  contains  few  incidents  that  de- 
part strikingly  from  the  ordinary  course  of  the  world.  In  his  own 
record,  things  that  are  insignificant  as  objects  of  general  interest 
assume  the  proportions  that  all  human  beings  must  assign  to  the 
events  of  their  own  lifa 

His  first  great  affliction  was  the  death  of  a  favourite  sister  when 
he  was  about  six  years  old.  Were  we  to  measure  him  by  the 
standard  of  ordinary  children,  we  should  refuse  to  believe  what  he 
tells  us  of  the  profound  gloom  thrown  over  him  by  this  bereave- 
ment— "  the  night  that  for  him  gathered  upon  that  event  ran  after 


32  THOMAS  DE   QUINCEY. 

his  steps  far  into  life."  "Well  it  was  for  me  at  this  period,"  lie 
says,  "  if  well  it  were  for  me  to  live  at  all,  that  from  any  continued 
contemplation  of  my  misery  I  was  forced  to  wean  myself,  and  sud- 
denly to  assume  the  harness  of  life." 

From  these  "  sickly  reveries  "  he  was  suddenly  withdrawn,  and 
"  introduced  to  the  world  of  strifa"  A  "  horrid  pugilistic  brother," 
five  or  six  years  older  than  himself,  whose  "genius  for  mischief 
amounted  to  inspiration,"  returned  home  from  a  public  school. 
The  character  of  this  brother  is  drawn  in  the  Sketches  with  ex- 
quisite humour  and  fondness.  He  was  a  boy  of  amazing  spirits 
and  volubility.  He  maintained  a  constant  war  with  the  boys  of  a 
neighbouring  factory,  and  compelled  little  Thomas  to  bear  a  part. 
He  kept  the  nursery  in  a  whirl  of  excitement  and  wonder  with  war 
bulletins,  ghost  stories,  tragic  theatricals,  and  burlesque  lectures 
"  on  all  subjects  known  to  man,  from  the  Thirty-nine  Articles  of 
our  English  Church  down  to  pyrotechnics,  legerdemain,  magic — 
both  black  and  white — thaumaturgy,  and  necromancy." 

After  two  years  of  this  excitement,  William  left  Greenhay,  and 
Thomas,  then  in  his  eighth  year,  relapsed  into  his  quiet  life,  and 
steadily  pursued  his  studies  under  one  of  his  guardians,  finding  in 
that  guardian's  family  other  objects  for  his  precocious  sympathy 
and  meditation.  When  he  was  eleven  years  old  his  mother  removed 
to  Bath,  and  placed  him  at  the  grammar-school  there.  He  had 
made  such  progress  under  his  guardian's  tutorship  that  at  Bath  his 
Latin  verses  were  paraded  by  the  head-master  as  an  incitement  to 
the  older  boys.  This  distinction  led  to  his  removal  from  the  school. 
His  austere  mother  was  so  shocked  at  the  compliments  he  was 
receiving,  that,  after  two  years,  she  sent  him  to  a  private  school  in 
Wiltshire,  "  of  which,"  he  says,  "  the  chief  recommendation  lay  iu 
the  religious  character  of  the  master."  At  Winkfield  he  remained 
but  a  year.  Then  came  a  pleasant  interlude  in  his  school  life.  He 
spent  the  summer  travelling  in  Ireland  with  Lord  Westport,  a  young 
friend  of  his  own  age,  and  on  his  return  stayed  for  three  months  at 
Laxton,  the  seat  of  Lord  Carbery,  where  he  studied  Greek  and 
talked  theology  with  the  beautiful  Lady  Carbery.  But  his  pleasures 
were  again  interrupted  by  the  higher  powers.  His  guardians  de- 
cided that  he  should  go  for  three  years  to  Manchester  grammar- 
school  before  proceeding  to  Oxford.  Some  boys  would  have  hailed 
the  change  with  pleasure,  but  young  De  Quincey,  though  then  but 
fifteen  and  a  few  months  more,  was  premature  in  the  expansion  of 
his  mind,  and  had  begun  to  think  boyish  society  intolerable.  He 
went  to  Manchester  in  1800,  but  he  could  not  bring  himself  to  be 
content  with  his  situation.  In  the  course  of  two  years  his  health 
gave  way,  and  no  longer  able  to  endure  the  restraint,  he  took  his 
departure  one  day  without  warning.  His  wanderings  did  not  last 
long.  He  walked  straight  to  Chester ;  and,  while  hanging  about 


LIFE.  33 

hia  mother's  house  trying  to  get  an  interview  with  his  sister,  was 
caught  by  an  easy  stratagem.  He  was  not,  however,  sent  back  to 
school,  but  remained  at  his  mother's  house  till  his  guardians  should 
decide  what  was  to  be  done  with  him. 

Soon  followed  the  great  adventure  of  his  life,  the  most  interest- 
ing part  of  his  Confessions.  Obtaining  some  money  from  his 
mother  for  a  pedestrian  tour  in  Wales,  he  tired  of  the  mountain 
solitudes,  and  shaped  his  course  to  London,  in  hopes  of  being  able 
to  borrow  two  hundred  pounds  on  his  expectations.  Here  he 
went  through  hard  experiences.  His  errand  brought  him  under 
the  vexatious  extortions  and  delays  of  a  money-lender.  He  was 
reduced  to  the  brink  of  starvation.  On  one  occasion,  indeed,  he 
might  have  perished  but  for  the  kindness  of  a  companion  in  mis- 
fortune, the  poor  outcast  Anne,  whom  in  happier  days  he  vainly 
sought  to  trace.  Fortunately  he  was  discovered  and  taken  home 
again.  He  remained  at  home  about  a  year ;  but  being  taunted 
by  his  uncle  with  wasting  his  time,  he  undertook  to  go  to  Oxford 
upon  ,s£ioo  of  an  annual  allowance,  and  proceeded  thither  in  the 
October  of  1803. 

The  'Autobiographic  Sketches,'  as  republished,  terminate  with 
his  sudden  resolution  to  go  to  Oxford.  In  their  original  form,  as 
contributions  to  '  Tait's  Magazine,'  three  more  papers  undertake 
to  describe  his  life  at  Oxford,  but  these  consist  mostly  of  rambling 
digressions  on  the  idea  of  an  English  University,  on  the  Greek 
orators,  on  Paley,  and  suchlike,  and  contain  very  little  personal 
narrative.  This  much  we  may  glean,  that  he  lived  a  hermit  kind 
of  life,  and  did  not  conform  in  the  least  to  the  studies  of  the  place. 
He  "  sequestered  himself "  so  completely  that  (to  quote  his  own 
expression),  "  for  the  first  two  years  of  my  residence  in  Oxford,  I 
compute  that  I  did  not  utter  one  hundred  words."  He  had  but 
one  conversation  with  his  tutor.  "  It  consisted  of  three  sentences, 
two  of  which  fell  to  his  share,  one  to  mine."  In  all  senses  he 
was  justified  in  exclaiming,  "  Oxford,  ancient  mother  !  hoary  with 
ancestral  honours,  time-honoured,  and,  haply  it  may  be,  time-shat- 
tered power,  I  owe  thee  nothing  !  Of  thy  vast  riches  I  took  not  a 
shilling,  though  living  among  multitudes  who  owed  to  thee  their 
daily  bread."  In  the  matter  of  study,  he  was  a  law  to  himself. 
He  told  his  tutor  in  that  notable  conversation  that  he  was  reading 
Paley ;  but  in  point  of  fact  he  had  been  "  reading  and  studying 
very  closely  the  '  Parmenides.'  "  As  a  schoolboy  he  had  attained 
to  an  unusual  mastery  over  the  Greek  language,  "  moving  through 
all  the  obstacles  and  resistances  of  a  Greek  book  with  the  same 
celerity  and  ease  as  through  those  of  the  French  and  Latin  "- 
and  he  read  Greek  daily;  "  but  any  slight  vanity  which  he  might 
connect  with  a  power  so  rarely  attained,  and  which,  under  ordinary 
circumstances,  so  readily  transmutes  itseli'  into  a  disproportionate 

c 


34  TIIOMAS   DE   QUIXCEY. 

admiration  of  the  author,  in  him  was  absolutely  swallowed  up  in  the 
tremendous  hold  taken  of  his  entire  sensibilities  at  this  time  by  our 
own  literature." 

In  his '  Recollections  of  Coleridge '  he  says,  "  From  1803  to  1808 
I  was  a  student  at  Oxford."  This  probably  means  that  for  those 
five  years  he  remained  formally  on  the  books  of  Worcester  College. 
How  much  of  this  time  he  spent  in  actual  residence  is  not  recorded, 
and  in  all  likelihood  cannot  be  ascertained.  When  we  consider  his 
self-determined  habits  of  study,  we  see  that  it  matters  compara- 
tively little  to  know  where  he  lived.  There  is  a  tradition  that  he 
once  submitted  to  the  written  part  of  the  Final  Examination,  but 
abruptly  left  Oxford  without  offering  himself  for  the  oral  part. 

In  the  intervals  of  his  residence  at  Oxford,  he  began  to  make 
occasional  visits  to  London,  and  to  get  introductions  to  literary 
society.  He  had  always  been  especially  anxious  to  see  Coleridge 
and  Wordsworth.  When  he  ran  away  from  school,  he  would  have 
gone  to  the  Lake  district,  had  he  not  scrupled  to  present  himself 
in  the  character  of  a  fugitive  schoolboy.  About  Christmas  1 804-5 
he  had  gone  to  London  with  an  introduction  to  Charles  Lamb,  his 
final  object  being  to  procure  through  Lamb  an  introduction  to 
Coleridge.  His  wishes  were  not  gratified  till  later  than  this.  He 
first  saw  Coleridge  at  Bristol  in  the  autumn  of  1807,  and  Words- 
worth later  in  the  same  year,  at  the  poet's  cottage  in  the  Vale  of 
Grasmere. 

In  the  winter  of  1808-9  he  took  up  his  residence  at  the  Lakes. 
Wordsworth  had  quitted  his  cottage  in  Grasmere  for  the  larger 
house  of  Allan  Bank,  and  De  Quincey  succeeded  this  illustrious 
tenant.  He  retained  this  cottage  for  seven-and-twenty  years,  and 
up  to  1829  it  was  his  principal  place  of  residence.  "From  this 
era,"  he  says,  "  through  a  period  of  about  twenty  years  in  succes- 
sion, I  may  describe  my  domicile  as  being  amongst  the  lakes  and 
mountains  of  Westmoreland.  It  is  true,  I  often  made  excursions 
to  London,  Bath,  and  its  neighbourhood,  or  northwards  to  Edin- 
burgh ;  and  perhaps,  on  an  average,  passed  one-fourth  part  of  each 
year  at  a  distance  from  this  district ;  but  here  only  it  was  that 
henceforwards  I  had  a  house  and  small  establishment."  A  good 
many  interesting  particulars  about  the  society  of  the  Lakes,  and 
his  way  of  passing  his  time,  are  given  in  some  papers  that  have 
not  been  republished  ('Tait's  Magazine,'  1840). 

From  the  time  of  his  settling  at  the  Lakes,  a  habit  grew  upon 
him  which  powerfully  influenced  his  life.  Some  four  years  after 
he  took  up  his  residence  at  Grasmere,  he  became  a  confirmed  and 
daily  opium-eater.  The  rise  and  progress  of  this  habit,  the  pleas- 
ures and  the  pains  of  the  "  pernicious  drug,"  and  the  miseries  of 
his  struggle  to  leave  it  off,  are  related  in  his  Opium  Confessions. 
He  had  first  tasted  opium  in  1804,  as  a  cure  for  toothache.  From 


LIFE.  35 

that  date  up  to  1812  he  took  opium  as  an  occasional  indulgence, 
"  fixing  beforehand  how  often,  within  a  given  time,  and  when,  he 
would  commit  a  debauch  of  opium."  It  was  not  till  1813  that 
opium  became  with  him  an  article  of  daily  diet ;  in  that  year  he 
multiplied  the  laudanum  drams  to  allay  "  an  appalling  irritation  of 
the  stomach."  The  large  doses  once  begun,  he  could  not  break  off. 
He  \vent  on  from  one  degree  of  indulgence  to  another,  till  in  1816 
he  was  taking  as  much  as  8000  drops  of  laudanum  per  day.  Prob- 
jil>ly  in  view  of  his  approaching  marriage,  he  succeeded  in  reducing 
his  allowance  to  1000  drops.  He  married  towards  the  close  of 
1816.  Up  to  the  midlle  of  1817  he  "judges  himself  to  have  been 
a  happy  man  ; "  and  he  draws  a  beautiful  picture  of  the  interior  of 
his  cottage  in  a  stormy  winter  night,  with  "warm  hearth-rugs,  tea, 
a  fair  tea-maker,  shutters  closed,  curtains  flowing  in  ample  draperies 
on  the  floor,  whilst  the  wind  and  rain  are  raging  audibly  without." 
Again  he  seems  to  have  lapsed  into  over-indulgence — to  have  suc- 
cumbed to  the  "  Circean  spells  "  of  opium.  The  next  four  years 
he  spent  in  a  kind  of  intellectual  torpor,  utterly  incapable  of 
sustained  exertion.  "  But  for  misery  and  suffering,"  he  says,  "  I 
might  indeed  be  said  to  have  existed  in  a  dormant  state.  I  sel- 
dom could  prevail  on  myself  to  write  a  letter.  An  answer  of  a  few 
words  to  any  that  I  received  was  the  utmost  that  I  could  accom- 
plish ;  and  often  that  not  until<the  letter  had  lain  weeks,  or  even 
months,  on  my  writing-table."  At  length  in  1821,  with  the  in- 
creasing expenses  of  his  household,  his  affairs  became  embarrassed, 
and  he  was  called  upon  by  the  strongest  inducements  to  shake  off 
this  dead  weight  upon  his  energies.  He  succeeded.  Unable  wholly 
to  renounce  the  use  of  opium,  he  yet  reduced  the  amount  so  far  as 
to  be  capable  of  literary  exertion.1 

His  first  production  was  the  '  Confessions  of  an  English  Opium- 
Eater.'  This  appeared  in  the  '  London  Magazine '  in  the  autumn 
of  1821,  and  was  reprinted  in  a  separate  form  in  the  following 
year. 

From  1821  to  1825,  though  he  still  spent  the  greater  part  of  his 
time  at  Grasmere,  he  was  often  in  London,  his  lodgings  being  in 
York  Street,  Co  vent  Garden.  During  that  time  he  was  a  frequent 
contributor  to  the  '  London  Magazine.'  He  speaks  of  his  "  daily 
task  of  writing  and  producing  something  for  the  journals ;"  calls 

1  The  Opium  Confessions,  as  they  stand  in  the  final  edition,  convey  the  im- 
pression, though  not  in  specific  words,  that  he  had  wholly  renounced  the  use  of 
opium,  and  he  is  usually  accused  of  having  pretended  to  a  self-command  that  he 
never  absolutely  acquired.  Had  the  appendix  to  the  first  edition  of  the  Confes- 
sions been  reprinted,  he  might  have  been  spared  this  nccusp.non.  He  there  ex- 
plains why,  in  the  narrative  as  originally  written  in  the  '  London  Magazine,'  he 
wished  to  convey  the  impression  that  he  had  wholly  renounced  the  use  of  opium  ; 
and  says  that  in  suffering  his  readers  to  think  of  him  as  a  reformed  opium-eater, 
he  left  no  impressiou  but  what  he  shared  himself. 


36  THOMAS   DE   QVINCEY. 

himself  "  one  of  the  corps  litter  air  e  ;  "  and  says  that  the  follow- 
ing writers  were  in  1821-2-3  "amongst  his  collaborateurs"  in  the 
'  London  Magazine ' — Charles  Lamb,  Hazlitt,  Allan  Cunningham, 
Hood,  Hamilton,  Reynolds,  Carey.  In  his  '  Noctes  Ambrosianag,' 
Christopher  North  says  that  the  magazine  failed  because  De  Quin- 
cey's  papers  were  glaringly  superior  to  the  other  contributions — a 
whimsical  gibe  at  the  other  contributors.  A  performance  of  his  in 
the  autumn  of  1824  may  be  mentioned  as  showing  how  thoroughly 
he  had  identified  himself  with  the  literary  brotherhood.  It  was,  as 
he  says,  "  the  most  complete  literary  hoax  that  ever  can  have  been 
perpetrated."  A  German  bookseller  had  published  a  novel  in  Ger- 
man under  the  title  of  '  Walladmoor,'  professing  that  it  was  a  trans- 
lation from  Sir  Walter  Scott.  De  Quincey  reviewed  the  pseudo- 
translation  hurriedly,  and  spoke  of  it  in  rather  high  terms,  chance 
having  directed  him  to  the  only  tolerable  passages  in  the  work. 
Thereupon  a  London  firm  conceived  the  idea  of  translating  it,  and 
employed  De  Quincey  as  translator.  When  he  came  to  go  through 
the  work  in  detail,  he  found  it,  as  he  says,  "such  'almighty'  non- 
sense (to  speak  transatlantice) "  that  translating  it  was  out  of  the 
question ;  and  accordingly  he  rewrote  the  greater  part  of  it.  All 
the  same,  his  composition  was  given  to  the  English  world  as  a 
translation  from  the  German.  His  dedication  of  the  performance 
to  the  German  forger  is  a  very  fine  piece  of  humour.  His  industry 
in  London  does  not  seem  to  have  been  sufficiently  rewarded  to 
relieve  him  from  his  embarrassments.  In  a  letter  to  Professor 
Wilson,  dated  from  London,  1825,  he  expresses  himself  as  being 
in  dread  of  apprehension  for  debt. 

After  1825  his  literary  activity  was  directed  almost  entirely  to 
Edinburgh.  He  was  probably  drawn  there  by  his  friendship  with 
Wilson.  In  1826  he  began,  in  '  Blackwood's  Magazine,'  a  series  of 
papers  under  the  title  of  "  Gallery  of  German  Prose  Classics  ;"  but 
opium-eaters,  as  he  said,  "  though  good  fellows  upon  the  whole, 
never  finish  anything  " — and  the  Gallery  never  received  more  than 
two  celebrities,  Lessing  and  Kant,  the  series  ending  with  the  third 
instalment  From  1825  to  1849  ne  wrote  a  great  deal  for  'Black- 
wood,'  contributing  altogether  about  fifty  papers  that  have  been 
reprinted,  three  or  four  sometimes  upon  one  subject.  Among  the 
most  famous  of  these  '  Blackwood  '  papers  were — "  Murder  con- 
sidered as  one  of  the  Fine  Arts"  (1827),  "Toilette  of  a  Hebrew 
Lady"  (1828),  "  Dr  Parr  and  his  Contemporaries,  or  Whiggism  in 
its  Relations  to  Literature"  (1831),  "The  Caesars"  (1832-3-4), 
"The  Essenes"  (1840),  "On  Style"  (1840-1),  "Homer  and  the 
Honaeridaa  "  (1841),  "  Coleridge  and  Opium-Eating  "  (1845),  "  Sus- 
piria  de  Profundis"  (1845),  "The  Mail-Coach,"  and  "The  Vision 
of  Sudden  Death"  (1849). 

In    1834  he   formed   another  very  fertile   literary  connection, 


LIFE.  37 

becoming  a  contributor  to  '  Tait's  Magazine.'  This  connection  ia 
better  known  than  his  earlier  and  longer-continued  connection  with 
Blackwood,  because  his  papers  were  not  anonymous,  but  bore  either 
his  own  name  or  the  well-known  alias,  "  The  English  Opium-Eater." 
He  contributed  very  regularly  up  to  1841,  and  again  in  1845  and 
1846.  He  sent  in  altogether  nearly  fifty  separate  papers,  of  which 
about  two-thirds  have  been  reprinted.  The  most  famous  were  his 
"Sketches  of  Life  and  Manners,  from  the  Autobiography  of  an 
English  Opium-tEater,"  contributed  at  intervals  up  to  1841.  For 
some  unexplained  reason,  not  more  than  one-half  of  these  have 
been  reprinted.  About  thirty  of  his  contributions  to  '  Tait '  were 
personal  reminiscences.  These  are  represented  in  his  collected 
works  by  two  volumes — 'Autobiographic  Sketches'  (vol.  xiv.) 
and  '  Recollections  of  the  Lakes '  (vol.  ii.)  Apart  from  these,  his 
best-known  papers  in  '  Tait '  were  "  A  Tory's  Account  of  Toryism, 
Whiggism,  and  Radicalism"  (1835-36). 

Little  seems  to  be  known  about  his  place  of  residence  from  1830 
to  1843.  Up  to  1829  he  lived  chiefly  at  Grasmere.  He  spent  the 
year  1830  with  Professor  Wilson  in  Edinburgh.  In  1835  he  gave 
up  his  cottage  at  Grasmere.  In  1843  he  settled  with  his  family  at 
Lasswade,  a  small  village  near  Edinburgh.  It  is  probably  to  this 
interval  that  we  must  refer  Mr  John  Hill  Burton's  somewhat  over- 
done sketch  of  his  habits  and  personal  appearance  in  the  '  Book- 
Hunter,'  where  De  Quincey  appears  as  "  Thomas  Papaverius,"  a 
"  mighty  book-hunter." 

During  1842-3-4  he  sent  nothing  to  'Tait,'  and  very  little  to 
'Blackwood';  and  in  1844  appeared  the  only  work  of  his  that 
first  saw  the  light  as  an  independent  book — '  The  Logic  of  Political 
Economy.'  It  is  not  a  complete  exposition  of  political  economy, 
but,  as  the  title  imports,  of  certain  first  principles — the  doctrines 
of  value,  market-value,  wages,  rent,  and  profits. 

As  in  the  case  of  Macaulay,  Carlyle,  and  others,  his  scattered 
contributions  to  periodical  literature  were  first  republished  in 
America.  The  collection  was  begun  by  the  firm  of  Ticknor,  Reed, 
&  Fields,  Boston,  in  1852,  without  the  author's  knowledge;  but 
the  publishers  generously  made  him  a  sharer  in  the  profits  of  the 
publication,  and  he  ultimately  gave  his  assistance  to  the  work  of 
collecting  the  scattered  papers.  The  first  English  edition,  "in 
fourteen  volumes  crown  8vo,  was  published  by  Messrs  Hogg  of 
Edinburgh,  during  the  eight  years  1853-60  ;  and  all  the  papers  it 
contained,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  in  the  last  volume,  enjoyed 
the  author's  revision  and  correction." 

His  last  productions  were  some  papers  on  China,  contributed  to 
'  Titan  '  (a  continuation  of  '  Hogg's  Instructor')  in  1856-57.  They 
are  not  included  in  his  collected  works,  but  are  republished  sepa- 
rately. 


l 


38  THOMAS  DE   QUINCEY, 

He  died  at  Edinburgh,  December  8,  1859,  in  his  seventy-fifth 
year. 


We  have  several  descriptions  of  De  Quincey's  personal  appear- 
ance. He  was  a  slender  little  man,  with  small,  clearly  chiselled 
features,  a  large  head,  and  a  remarkably  high,  square  forehead. 
"In  addition,"  says  Professor  Masson,  "to  the  general  impression 
of  his  diminutiveness  and  fragility,  one  was  struck  with  the  pecu- 
liar beauty  of  his  head  and  forehead,  rising  disproportionately  high 
over  his  small,  wrinkly  visage,  and  gentle,  deep-set  eyes."  There 
was  a  peculiarly  high  and  regular  arch  in  the  wrinkles  of  his  brow, 
which  was  also  slightly  contracted.  The  lines  of  his  countenance 
' .,-  fell  naturally  into  an  expression  of  mild  suffering,  of  endurance 
sweetened  by  benevolence,  or,  according  to  the  fancy  of  the  inter- 
preter, of  gentle,  melancholy  sweetness,  i,  All  that  met  him  .seem 
to  have  been  struck  with  the  measured,  silvery,  yet  somewhat 
hollow  and  unearthly,  tones  of  his  voice,  the  more  impressive  that 
the  flow  of  his  talk  was  unhesitating  and  unbroken. 
f  "  Although  a  man  considerably  under  height  and  slender  of 
form,  he  was  capable  of  undergoing  great  fatigue,  and  took  con- 
stant exercise."  His  having  been  the  travelling  companion  of 
Christopher  North  about  the  English  lakes  is  a  sufficient  certificate. 
The  .weak  point  in  his  bodily  system,  as  he  frequently  tells  us,  was 
his  stomach.  This  weakness  he  often  pleads  as  the  justification  of 
his  opium-eating.  Opium  was  "  the  sole  remedy  potent  enough  to 
control  his  distress  and  irritability."  He  sometimes  humorously 
exaggerates  his  infirmity.  "  A  more  worthless  body  than  his  own, 
the  author  is  free  to  confess,  cannot  be.  It  is  his  pride  to  believe 
that  it  is  the  very  ideal  of  a  base,  crazy,  despicable  human  system, 
that  hardly  ever  could  have  been  meant  to  be  seaworthy  for  two 
days  under  the  ordinary  storms  and  wear  and  tear  of  life ;  and, 
indeed,  if  that  were  the  creditable  way  of  disposing  of  human 
bodies,  he  must  own  that  he  should  almost  be  ashamed  to  bequeath 
his  wretched  structure  to  any  respectable  dog." 

As  often  happens,1  the  impoverishment  of  certain  bodily  organs 
was  accompanied,  if  not  caused,  by  an  enormous  and  dispropor- 
tionate activity  of  intellect.  It  may  be  doubted  whether  we  have 
ever  seen  in  this  quarter  of  the  globe  a  man  so  completely  absorbed 
in  mental  operations,  and  so  far  removed  from  our  ordinary  way 
of  looking  at  the  world.  He  resembled  the  contemplative  sages  of 
India  more  than  the  intellectual  men  of  rough,  practical  England. 

1  "  In  general,"  says  our  author,  "  a  man  has  reason  to  think  himself  well  off 
In  the  great  lottery  of  this  life  if  he  draws  the  prize  of  a  healthy  stomach  with- 
out a  mind,  or  the  prize  of  a  fine  intellect  with  a  crazy  stomach  ;  but  that  any 
man  should  draw  both  is  truly  astonishing,  and,  I  suppose,  happens  ouly  ouc« 
in  a  century." 


CHARACTER.  39 

J- 

Of  no  man  can  it  be  absolutely  true  that  he  does  nothing  but  ob- 
serve, read,  meditate,  imagine,  and  communicate  the  results ;  but 
this  may  be  affirmed  of  De  Quincey  with  a  nearer  approach  to  truth 
than  it  can  be  affirmed  of  any  other  great  name  in  our  literature. 

In  reading  his  works,  one  of  the  first  things  that  strike  us  is  the 
extreme  multifariousness  of  his  knowledge.     When  we  compare 
him   even  with  writers  of  a  high  order,  we    cannot  help  being  ^^ 
ustoriished  at  the  force  of  a  memory  that  could  hold  so  much  in  t 
readiness  for  immediate  use.     He  was  noted  for  conversational 
powers ;  and,  as  he  himself  explains,  one  of  his  peculiar  advantages 
for  conversation  was  "  a  prodigious  memory  "  and  "  an  inexhaust- 
ible fertility  of  topics." 

In  his  writings  this  retentive  capacity  often  makes  us  pause  and 
wonder.  For  some  of  his  most  curious  freaks  of  scholarship,  in- 
deed, his  "  Toilette  of  a  Hebrew  Lady "  and  his  "  Casuistry  of 
Roman  Meals,"  he  took  most  of  the  materials  at  second-hand  from 
the  German.  Still,  if  we  were  to  assemble  all  his  digressions, 
quotations,  notes,  and  allusions,  we  should  be  sufficiently  convinced 
of  the  immense  and  eccentric  range  of  his  reading,  and  at  the  same 
time  of  his  tenacious  hold  of  what  he  had  read.  Indeed,  if  we 
were  to  make  such  a  collection,  we  should  be  no  less  astonished  at 
the  extent  of  another  field  of  his  memory.  We  should  find  that 
he  was  a  close  observer  of  human  character,  and  that  he  noted  and 
remembered  characteristic  peculiarities  and  expressions  of  feeling  ( 
with  Boswellian  minuteness.  In  the  course  of  his  wanderings  he 
met  persons  of  all  ranks  and  conditions,  and  he  seldom  mentions  a 
name  without  giving  some  characteristic  particulars  of  the  person. 

Then,  as  regards  the  other  great  intellectual  force — the  power!  -, 
of  recovering  analogous  circumstances  or  detecting  hidden  resem-  «s 
blances — De  Quincey  had  a  very  remarkable,  perhaps  a  still  more 
remarkable,  endowment.  Speaking  of  his  conversational  powers, 
he  says  that  in  addition  to  the  advantage  of  a  prodigious  memory, 
he  had  "  the  far  greater  advantage  of  a  logical  instinct  for  feeling 
in  a  moment  the  secret  analogies  or  parallelisms  that  connected 
things  else  apparently  remote."  And  again,  writing  of  his  powers 
of  memory,  he  says,  "  I  mention  this  in  no  spirit  of  boasting.  Far 
from  it;  for,  on  the  contrary,  amongst  my  mortifications  have  been 
compliments  to  my  memory,  when,  in  fact,  any  compliment  that  I 
had  merited  was  due  to  the  higher  faculty  of  an  electric  aptitude 
for  seizing  analogies,  and,  by  means  of  those  aerial  pontoons,  pass- 
ing over  like  lightning  from  one  topic  to  another."  l  This  power 
appears  in  his  writings  in  several  shapes.  The  quotations  and 
allusions  that  show  his  wide  knowledge  of  books  and  men  are  very 
obvious  signs  of  the  activity  of  his  analogical  faculty.  His  numer- 
ous illustrations,  and  the  metaphorical  cast  of  his  language,  are  no 
1  Blaekwood's  Magazine,  April  1845. 


40  THOMAS  DE   QUINCEY. 

less  striking.  Less  obtrusive  evidences  of  the  faculty,  but  stih 
more  valuable  as  being  evidences  of  its  strength,  are  his  power  of 
breaking  through  routine  views,  and  the  ingenious  plausibility  of 
his  arguments.  He  very  rarely  assumes  a  traditional  view  without 
some  note  of  exception,  and  this  evidently  not  from  a  rough  love 
of  paradox — as  is  sometimes  alleged  by  careless  readers — but  from 
his  strong  and  delicate  sensibility  to  the  exact  relations  of  things. 
Nothing  can  be  more  exquisite  than  his  subtlety  in  distinguishing 
wherein  things  agree  and  wherein  they  differ — in  what  respects  a 
traditional  view  is  warrantable,  and  in  what  respects  it  is  errone- 
.  pus.  Equally  charming  to  the  lover  of  intellectual  subtlety  are 
his  deliberate  arrays  of  argument  in  support  of  a  favourite  thesis, 
as  seen  in  such  performances  as  his  paper  on  the  Essenes,  or  his 
attempt  to  whitewash  the  character  of  Judas  Iscariot.  His  skill 
in  urging  every  circumstance  favourable  to  his  opinion,  and  in  ex- 
plaining away  everything  that  bears  against  it,  gives  to  the  Eng- 
lish reader  an  idea  of  elaborate  ingenuity  not  to  be  obtained  from 
any  other  of  our  recognised  "leaders  of  literature." 

Were  De  Quincey's  writings  the  outcome  of  nothing  more  gen- 
erally attractive  than  profound  erudition,  intellectual  subtlety,  and 
powers  of  copious  expression,  they  would  not  have  taken  such  a 
hold  of  public  interest.  But  he  was  not  an  arid  philosopher,  a 
modern  Duns  Scotus  or  Thomas  Aquinas.  He  tells  us  that  he 
read  "  German  metaphysicians,  Latin  schoolmen,  thaumaturgic 
Platonists,  and  religious  Mystics,"  but  he  tells  us  also  that  at  one 
time  "  a  tremendous  hold  was  taken  of  his  entire  sensibilities  by  our 
own  literature."  Though  he  "  well  knew  that  his  proper  vocation 
was  the  exercise  of  the  analytic  understanding,"  he  spent  perhaps 
the  greater  part  of  his  time  in  the  exercise  of  the  imagination, 
taking  profound  delight  in  "  the  sublimer  and  more  passionate 
poets,"  in  "the  grand  lamentations  of  Samson  Agonistes,  or  the 
great  harmonies  of  the  Satanic  speeches  in  'Paradise  Regained.'  " 

He  described  himself  as  a  Eudaemonist  or  Hedonist — averse  to 
everything  that  did  not  bring  him  immediate  enjoyment ;  and  this 
half-humorous  description  may  be  allowed,  if  we  take  care  not  to 
forget  that  his  enjoyments  were  of  a  peculiar  nature.  His  pleas- 
ures were  not  boisterous — not  dependent  upon  a  flow  of  animal 
spirits.  He  was  an  intellectual  Hedonist,  or  pleasure -seeker. 
During  a  considerable  part  of  his  time  he  was  rapt  in  his  favourite 
studies,  in  works  of  the  analytic  understanding,  of  history,  and  of 
imagination.  But  even  in  daily  life,  in  intercourse  with  the  world, 
his  imagination  seems  to  have  been  preternaturally  active.  He 
was  a  close  observer  of  character,  as  we  can  see  both  from  his 
works  and  from  the  testimony  of  those  that  knew  him.  But,  as 
we  also  know  from  both  sources,  his  imagination  was  constantly 
active  in  shaping  his  surroundings  into  objects  of  refined  pleasure, 


CHARACTER.  41 

ranging  through  many  varieties  of  grave  and  gay.  He  applied 
this  transfiguring  process  to  the  incidents  of  his  own  life  — not 
inventing  romantic  or  comical  incidents,  but  dwelling  upon  certain 
features  of  what  really  took  place,  and  investing  them  with  lofty, 
tender,  or  humorous  imagery.  So  with  his  friends  and  casual 
acquaintances.  He  was  sufficiently  observant  of  what  they  really 
did  and  said,  was  remarkably  acute  in  divining  what  passed  in 
their  minds,  and  felt  the  disagreeable  as  well  as  the  agreeable 
points  of  their  character ;  but  he  had  the  power  of  abstracting 
from  the  disagreeable  circumstances.  He  fixed  his  imagination 
upon  the  agreeable  side  of  an  acquaintance,  and  transmuted  the 
mixed  handiwork  of  nature  into  a  pure  object  of  aesthetic  pleasure.1 

His  pleasures,  we  have  said,  were  not  boisterous.  He  had  not 
the  constitution  for  hearty  enjoyment  of  life.  In  his  Sketches 
he  describes  himself  as  being,  in  his  boyhood,  "  the  shiest  of 
children,"  "  constitutionally  touched  with  pensiveness,"  "  natu- 
rally dedicated  to  despondency."  From  his  repose  of  manners  he 
was  a  privileged  visitor  to  the  bedroom  of  his  dying  father.  He 
was  passionately  fond  of  peace,  had  "a  perfect  craze  for  being 
despised" — considering  contempt  as  the  only  security  for  un- 
molested repose — and  always  tried  to  hide  his  precocious  accom- 
plishments from  the  curiosity  of  strangers.  All  his  life  through 
he  retained  this  shyness.  He  had  splendid  conversational  powers, 
and  never  was  silent  from  timidity,  at  least  when  under  the  in- 
fluence of  his  favourite  opium ;  and  yet  he  rather  avoided  than 
courted  society.  He  humorously  tells  us  how  he  was  horrified 
at  a  party  in  London  when  he  saw  a  large  company  of  guests 
filing  in  one  after  the  other,  and  divined  from  their  looks  that 
they  had  come  to  "  lionise "  the  Opium-Eater.  Mr  Hill  Burton 
represents  the  difficulty  of  getting  him  out  to  literary  parties  in 
Edinburgh  in  spite  of  his  most  solemn  promises  ;  and  we  have 
from  Professor  Masson  a  pleasant  instance  of  his  shyness  to 
recognise  a  new  acquaintance  in  the  street,  and  of  his  nervous- 
ness when  he  found  himself  the  subject  of  observation. 

Such  a  man  often  contracts  strong  special  attachments.  In 
some  of  the  impassioned  records  of  the  Confessions  and  the 
'Autobiographic  Sketches,'  we  have  evidence  of  the  strength  of 
De  Quincey's  affections.  In  writing  of  living  friends,  he  usually 
practises  a  delicate  reserve,  and  veils  his  tenderness  under  the 
mask  of  humour.  Yet  even  to  this  there  are  some  exceptions, 
such  as  the  touching  address  to  his  absent  wife  in  the  Opium 
Confessions.  In  writing  of  departed  friends,  he  pours  out  his 
feelings  without  reserve.  His  sister  Elizabeth,  the  outcast  Anne, 

1  It  is  not  meant  that  he  was  so  unlike  other  men  as  to  be  doing  this  con- 
stantly ;  only  that  he  seized  upon  and  transfigured  actual  objects  into  ideals 
much  more  than  the  generality  of  intellectual  men. 


42  THOMAS  DE   QUINCE Y. 

the  infant  daughter  of  Wordsworth,  and  his  unfortunate  friend 
Charles  Lloyd,1  may  be  mentioned  as  objects  that  at  different 
periods  of  his  life  engrossed  his  affections,  and  whose  loss  he 
deplores  with  impassioned  sorrow. 

He  has  sometimes  been  accused  of  letting  his  imagination  dwell 
too  favourably  upon  himself — of  being  especially  vain.  Now  we 
call  a  man  vain  when  he  pretends  to  something  that  he  does  not 
possess,  or  when  he  makes  an  ostentatious  display  of  his  posses- 
sions. It  has  not  been  alleged  that  De  Quincey  was  vain  in  the 
first  and  worst  sense ;  he  has  never  been  accused  of  exaggerating 
for  the  purpose  of  extorting  admiration.  But  it  is  alleged  that 
he  was  vain  in  the  second  sense ;  that  he  makes  a  complacently 
ostentatious  display  of  his  ancestral  line,  of  his  aristocratic  con- 
nections, of  his  romantic  adventures,  of  his  philosophical  know- 
ledge, of  his  wonderful  dreams.  Such  a  charge  could  hardly  be 
made  but  by  a  hasty  or  an  undiscriminating  reader.  In  the 
'Autobiographic  Sketches'  we  are  never  complacently  invited 
to  admire.  We  never  think  of  the  writer  as  a  self-glorified 
hero,  unless  we  are  all  the  more  jealous  of  being  thrown  into  the 
shade.  We  are  taken  into  his  confidence,  but  he  challenges  our 
sympathy,  not  our  admiration.  He  often  speaks  of  himself 
humorously,  but  never  with  ostentatious  complacency.  He  treats 
himself  with  no  greater  favour  than  any  of  the  other  subjects 
of  his  narrative.  The  truth  seems  to  be,  that  he  who  observed 
and  speculated  upon  every  human  creature  that  came  under  his 
notice,  observed  and  speculated  most  of  all  upon  himself  as  the 
human  creature  that  he  was  best  acquainted  with.  He  was  too 
discerning  a  genius  to  be  unconscious  of  his  own  excellence,  and 
too  little  of  a  humbug  to  pretend  that  he  was. 

As  he  has  been  accused  of  vanity,  so  he  has  sometimes  been 
accused  of  arrogance,  upon  a  still  graver  misconception  of  his 
shy,  retiring  nature,  and  his  humorous  self-irony.  His  dogmatic 
judgments  of  Plato,  Cicero,  Dr  Johnson,  and  other  eminent  men, 
and  his  strong  expressions  of  national  and  political  prejudice, 
are  sometimes  quoted  as  signs  of  a  tendency  to  domineer.  It 
may  safely  be  asserted  that  whoever  takes  up  this  view  has  not 
penetrated  far  into  the  peculiar  personality  of  De  Quincey.  What- 
ever might  be  the  strength  of  his  expressions,  and  these  were  often 
exaggerated  for  comic  effect,  there  have  been  few  men  of  equal 
power  more  unaffectedly  open  to  reasonable  conviction.  When 
he  had  made  up  his  mind,  he  took  a  pleasure,  usually  a  humorous 
pleasure,  in  putting  his  opinion  as  strongly  as  possible ;  but  that 
was  no  index  as  regarded  his  susceptibility  to  new  light.  This 
we  may  reasonably  infer  from  his  character  as  revealed  in  his 
works ;  and  if  we  need  further  evidence,  we  have  it  in  the  words 
1  The  two  last  are  mentioned  in  papers  that  have  not  been  reprinted. 


CHARACTER  43 

of  his  personal  acquaintance  Mr  Burton,  who  speaks  of  his  "  gentle 
and  kindly  spirit,"  and  his  boyish  ardour  at  making  a  new  dis- 
covery. Equally  mistaken  is  the  charge  of  jealousy,  which  cornea 
from  some  admirers  of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge.  He  always, 
and  with  obvious  sincerity,  professed  an  admiration  for  the  extra- 
ordinary qualities  of  these  men,  but  he  knew  exactly  where  their 
strength  lay ;  he  knew  that  both  were  men  of  special  strength 
combined  with  special  infirmity,  and  in  his  "Recollections"  of 
them,  while  doing  all  justice  to  their  merits,  he  did  not  scruple 
to  expose  their  faults.  On  this  ground  he  is  charged  with  jeal- 
ousy. But  before  we  admit  a  charge  so  inconsistent  with  what 
we  know  of  his  character  otherwise,  it  must  be  shown  that  hia 
criticisms  are  unfair,  or  that  they  contain  anything  that  can  be 
construed  into  an  evidence  of  malice.  Had  De  Quincey  been 
a  jealous,  irritable  man,  instead  of  being  "gentle  and  kindly" 
as  he  was,  the  universally  attested  arrogance  and  contemptuous 
manner  of  Wordsworth  would  have  driven  him  to  take  part  with 
the  '  Edinburgh  Review,'  and  in  that  case  the  great  poet's  reputa- 
tion might  have  been  considerably  delayed. 

I  have  dwelt  at  disproportionate  length  upon  two  qualities  that 
are  not  marked  in  De  Quincey's  character,  simply  for  the  reason 
that  unappreciative  critics  have  described  them  as  the  ruling 
emotions  of  his  personal  reminiscences.  To  discuss  them  at  such 
length  without  a  guarding  statement  would  create  misconception. 
We  may  say,  in  loose  terms,  that  two  kinds  of  emotion  almost 
engrossed  his  imagination,  and  that  these,  in  the  peculiar  form 
they  assumed  in  De  Quincey,  were  diametrically  antagonistic  and 
inevitably  destructive  to  emotions  so  petty  as  vanity  or  jealous 
egotism.  These  two  ruling  emotions  may  be  vaguely  described 
as  humour  and  sublimity. 

Though  naturally  unfitted  for  rough  merriment,  for  Teufels- 
droeckh  laughter,  De  Quincey  had  a  keen  sense  of  the  ridiculous. 
None  of  his  papers  are  without  humorous  strokes,  and  some  of 
them  are  extravagantly  humorous  from  beginning  to  end.  Chris- 
topher North  began  to  take  opium,  but  desisted  upon  finding,  as 
he  said,  that  it  destroyed  his  moral  sensibilities,  and  put  him  into 
such  a  condition  of  mind  that  he  was  ready  to  laugh  at  anything, 
no  matter  how  venerable.  It  is  sometimes  said  that  opium  had  a 
similar  effect  upon  De  Quincey.  But,  as  he  would  have  delighted 
to  point  out,  a  distinction  must  be  drawn  as  regards  laughter  at 
things  venerable :  the  laugh  may  be  malicious,  designed  to  bring 
a  venerable  object  into  contempt,  or  it  may  be  humorous,  revolv- 
ing simply  upon  its  own  extravagance — degradation  of  the  object 
being  manifestly  serious  and  ill-natured  in  the  one  case,  and 
manifestly  whimsical  and  good-natured  in  the  other.  There  is 
not  a  trace  of  malice  in  De  Quincey's  laughter.  It  is,  as  he 


44  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

described  it  himself,  merely  "humorous  extravagance."  He  is 
a  humourist,  not  a  satirist.  Sometimes  he  treats  venerable  persons 
or  institutions  with  playful  banter.  Sometimes,  by  a  kind  of 
inverse  process,  he  takes  a  pleasure  in  speaking  of  mean  occupa- 
tions with  expressions  of  mock  dignity.  One  unique  vein  of  his 
humour  consists  in  speaking  with  affection  or  admiration,  or  with 
a  dry  business  tone,  concerning  objects  usually  regarded  with 
horror  and  indignation.  Whatever  he  does,  as  we  shall  see  when 
we  come  to  exemplify  his  humour,  he  does  all  with  good-nature. 
He  seldom  applies  his  banter  to  living  persons,  and  then  in  such 
a  way  tliat  none  but  very  touchy  subjects  could  take  offence. 
Indeed,  so  playful  and  stingless  is  his  humour,  that  many  profess 
themselves  unable  to  see  anything  to  laugh  at  in  his  peculiar 
extravagances.  In  humour,  of  course,  everything  depends  upon 
the  reader's  attitude  of  mind.  De  Quincey's  own  answer  to  his 
censors  is  complete :  "  Not  to  sympathise  is  not  to  understand ; 
and  the  playfulness  which  is  not  relished,  becomes  flat  and  insipid, 

I  or  absolutely  without  meaning." 

r~;  His  genius  for  the  sublime  is  unquestioned.  He  was  singularly 
open  to  impressions  of  grandeur.  As  in  his  humour,  so  in  his 
susceptibility  to  sublime  effects,  it  is  difficult  for  an  energetic 
people  like  us  to  lower  ourselves  into  this  peculiar  state  of  mind. 
I  say  to  lower  ourselves,  for  the  effort  implies  a  diminution  of 
our  active  energies  and  the  intensifying  of  our  passive  suscepti- 
bilities. One  of  the  best  ways  of  understanding  De  Quincey  in 
his  sublime  moods  is  to  contrast  him  with  Carlyle  in  his  so-called 
hero-worship.  The  attitude  of  mind  in  worship,  as  usually  under- 
stood, is  a  passive  attitude — an  attitude  of  reverential  prostration, 
of  adoring  contemplation.  If  this  be  so,  the  term  worship  is 
incorrectly  applied  to  Carlyle's  attitude,  and  applies  with  much 
greater  propriety  to  De  Quincey's.  Carlyle's  state  of  mind  seems 
to  be  a  state  of  exalted  activity.  A  man  of  force  and  vigour,  he 
seems  to  sympathise  with  the  efforts  of  his  heroes — to  feel  himself, 
in  thinking  of  them,  exalted  to  the  same  pitch  of  victorious 
energy.  Now  this  is  not  a  state  of  prostration,  of  adoration, 
but  the  highest  possible  state  of  ideal  activity — the  moment  of 
success  in  imaginary  Titanic  effort.  On  the  contrary,  De  Quin- 
cey's attitude  is  essentially  an  attitude  of  adoration,  of  awe-struck 
passivity.  He  lies  still,  as  it  were, — remains  quiescent ;  passively 
allows  magnificent  conceptions  to  enter  his  mind  and  dwell  there. 
Carlyle's  hero-worship  is  more  the  intoxication  of  power  than  the 
worship  of  power,  the  sublime  of  egotism  more  than  the  sublime 
of  adoration.  The  vision  of  great  manifestations  of  power  seems 
to  act  upon  the  one  as  a  stimulant,  upon  the  other  as  A  narcotic, 
conspiring  with  the  subduing  influence  of  "  all-potent  opium." 
The  power  that  walks  in  darkness,  that  leaves  for  the  imagina- 


CHARACTER.  45 

tion  a  wide  margin  of  "  potentiality,"  is  more  impressive  than 
power  with  a  definite  limit  Accordingly  De  Quincey  tells  us  that 
"his  nature  almost  demanded  mystery." 

The  pleasing  astonishment  inspired  by  visions  of  grandeur  is 
nearly  allied  to  awe,  and  awe  passes  readily  into  panic  dread. 
This  De  Quincey  experienced  in  his  opium-dreams.  "Clouds  of 
gloomy  grandeur  overhung  his  dreams  at  all  stages  of  opium,  and, 
in  the  last,  grew  into  the  darkest  of  miseries."  His  dreams  were 
tumultuous  —  "with  dreadful  faces  thronged  and  fiery  arms." 
Sometimes  gorgeous  spectacles,  "such  as  never  yet  were  beheld 
by  waking  eye,"  suddenly  gave  place  to  "  hurrying  trepidations." 
Sometimes  he  was  filled  with  apprehensions  of  frightful  disaster, 
while  kept  motionless  by  "  the  weight  of  twenty  Atlantics." 

As  regards  the  sensuous  framework  of  De  Quincey's  emotions, 
it  is  interesting  to  notice  his  peculiar  sensibility  to  the  luxuries 
and  grandeurs  of  the  ear.  He  was  not  insensible  to  the  "pomps 
and  glories  "  of  the  eye,  but  the  ear  was  his  most  highly  endowed 
sense.  This  is  his  own  analysis.  He  recognised,  he  ^aid,  his  sen- 
sibility  to  music  as  rising  above  the  common  standard  by  various 
tests — "by  the  indispensableness  of  it  to  his  daily  comfort,  the 
readiness  with  which  he  made  any  sacrifices  to  obtain  a  'grand 
debauch'  of  that  nature,  &c.  &c."  He  might  have  mentioned  as 
a  good  confirmation  that  he  broke  through  the  traditional  expla- 
nation of  ^Eschylus's  "multitudinous  laughter  of  the  boundless 
ocean,"  as  referring  to  the  visual  appearance  of  the  waves,  and 
asked  whether  it  might  not  refer  to  the  sounds  of  the  ocean.  For 
him  the  image  would  have  had  a  greater  charm  if  referred  to  the 
ear.  One  of  his  favourite  pleasures  of  "  imagination  "  (if  we  may 
use  the  word  in  a  sense  not  exactly  warranted  by  its  derivation) 
was  to  construct  ideal  music  out  of  the  sounds  of  nature.  "  Often 
and  often,"  he  says,  "  seating  myself  on  a  stone  by  the  side  of  the 
mountain-river  Brathay,  I  have  stayed  for  hours  listening  to  the 

same  sound  to  which  so  often  C L and  I  used  to  hearken 

together  with  profound  emotion  and  awe — the  sound  of  pealing 
anthems,  as  if  streaming  from  the  open  portals  of  some  illimitable 
cathedral ;  and  many  times  I  have  heard  it  of  a  quiet  night,  when 
no  stranger  could  have  been  persuaded  to  believe  it  other  than  the  ) 
sound  of  choral  chanting — distant,  solemn,  saintly." 

When  we  view  De  Quincey  on  the  active  side,  we  find  a  great 
deficiency,  corresponding  to  his  intense  occupation  with  the  exercise 
of  the  analytic  understanding  and  the  imagination,  both  in  the 
study  and  in  the  actual  world.  He  was  signally  wanting  in  the 
pushing  activity  of  the  English  race.  Very  characteristic  is  what 
he  tells  us  of  his  boyhood,  that  when  he  was  ordered  to  do  a  thing, 


48  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

instead  of  forthwith  rushing  off  to  do  it,  or  stubbornly  refusing 
obedience,  like  an  active  English  child,  he  first  made  sure  that  he 
exactly  understood  the  mandate,  bothering  his  superior  to  express 
himself  with  scrupulous  precision  of  language. 

He  took  little  interest  in  the  practical  "questions"  of  the 
day.  He  is  said  to  have  written,  about  1821,  a  criticism  of  Lord 
Brougham  under  the  title  of  "  Close  Comments  on  a  Straggling 
Speech ; "  but  this,  one  may  guess,  was  more  humorous  than 
practical.  On  one  occasion  he  professed  to  "descend  from  his 
long  habits  of  philosophical  speculation  to  a  casual,  intercourse 
with  fugitive  and  personal  politics" — namely,  in  1835,  when  he 
wrote  his  "  Account  of  Toryism,  Whiggism,  and  Radicalism  "  for 
'Tait's  Magazine.'  Here,  however,  quite  as  much  as  elsewhere, 
he  is  still  the  abstract  philosopher,  not  the  man  of  practice :  he 
expressly  refuses  to  discuss  the  policy  of  the  rival  parties  on  any 
particular  question,  and  confines  himself  to  an  original  exposition 
of  their  abstract  creeds,  their  mutual  relations  to  the  British  Con- 
stitution. So  little  practical  interest  did  he  take  in  the  current 
business  of  the  nation,  that  at  one  time  he  acknowledges  that  he 
had  not  read  a  newspaper  for  three  years.  One  must  almost 
suppose  that  he  informed  himself  of  the  proceedings  of  existing 
parties  with  no  livelier  interest  than  he  took  in  the  proceedings  of 
parties  in  ancient  Greece  or  Rome. 

His  habits  seem  to  have  been  very  irregular.  He  did  not  want 
steadiness  of  application  to  special  studies ;  he  did  not  roam  rest- 
lessly from  field  to  field,  but  set  himself  down  to  a  subject,  and 
mastered  it,  not  content  till  he  had  read  everything  that  he  could 
find  upon  the  particular  subject  But  he  hated  the  labour  of  pro- 
ducing, at  times  with  an  absolute  loathing.  He  wrote  nothing 
till  forced  by  pecuniary  embarrassment.  In  the  course  of  some 
remarks  on  Coleridge,  he  says  that  it  is  characteristic  of  an  opium- 
eater  to  finish  nothing  that  he  begins ;  and  his  own  works  to  some 
extent  bear  out  this  humorous  principle. 

Mr  Hill  Burton  gives  an  interesting  picture  of  his  indifference 
to  the  ordinary  ways  of  human  business.  "  Only  immediate  crav- 
ing necessities  could  ever  extract  from  him  an  acknowledgment  of 
the  common  vulgar  agencies  by  which  men  subsist  in  civilised 
society."  "  Those  who  knew  him  a  little  might  call  him  a  loose 
man  in  money  matters ;  those  who  knew  him  closer,  laughed  at 
the  idea  of  coupling  any  notion  of  pecuniary  or  other  like  respon- 
sibility with  his  nature." 

As  regards  his  OPINIONS.  He  professed  himself  a  Tory  in 
politics,  and  spoke  with  sternness,  and  even  ferocity,  concerning 
Whigs,  Radicals,  Republicans,  Revolutionists,  and  "  the  faction  of 
Jacobinism  through  its  entire  gamut."  He  objected  to  the  Reform 


OPINIONS.  47 

Bill  of  1832  that  it  had  "ruffianised"  Parliament — "introduced  a 
Kentucky  element "  into  an  assembly  conducted  with  more  than 
Roman  dignity.  Theoretically,  he  held  that  both  Whigs  and 
Tories  were  necessary  to  the  British  Constitution,  as  guiding  the 
two  opposed  forces  of  the  nation,  the  one  the  democratic,  the  other 
the  aristocratic ;  that,  properly  understood,  they  were  as  two  hemi- 
spheres, the  one  incomplete  without  the  other.  In  their  views  of 
current  questions,  one  party  must  be  right  and  the  other  wrong, 
at  least  so  far ;  but  as  regarded  their  reasons  for  existing,  it  was 
absurd  to  ask  which  was  right  and  which  was  wrong — both  must 
exist.  He  belonged  himself  by  birth  to  the  aristocratic  party, 
and  probably  in  his  philosophic  way  he  considered  it  his  duty  to 
criticise  Radicals  from  the  aristocratic  point  of  view,  using  strong 
language  without  any  corresponding  strength  of  feeling. 

As  a  literary  critic,  his  catholicity  of  spirit  and  breadth  of  view 
were  unique  among  the  men  of  his  time.  Rarely  indeed,  if  ever, 
has  a  mind  so  calm,  unprejudiced,  and  comprehensive,  been  applied 
to  the  work  of  criticism.  In  his  own  day  he  was  usually  numbered 
among  the  "  Lakers,"  or  partisans  of  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  #nd 
Southey.  He  was  so  only  in  the  sense  of  treating  these  remark- 
able men  with  justice.  He,  better  than  Jeffrey  himself,  knew  the 
shortcomings  of  Wordsworth,  condemned  his  theory  of  poetic 
diction,  and  made  fun  of  absurdities  in  "  The  Excursion "  ;  but 
he  felt  the  shortcomings  with  calm  discrimination,  and  was  not 
misled  by  them  into  undervaluing  the  striking  originality  of 
Wordsworth's  genius.  He  was  one  of  the  most  devout  of  the 
admirers  of  Shakspeare,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  entered  with  pas- 
sionate rapture-  into  the  majestic  harmonies  of  Milton  ;  but  he  had 
no  part  in  the  common  bond  of  the  Lakers — their  wholesale  con- 
tempt for  Pope.  He  says,  in  one  of  his  "  uncollected  "  papers : — 

"In  the  literature  of  every  nation,  we  are  naturally  disposed  to  place  in 
the  highest  rank  those  who  have  produced  some  great  and  colossal  work — a 
'Paradise  Lost,'  a  'Hamlet,'  a  'Novum  Organum' — which  presupposes  an 
effort  of  intellect,  a  comprehensive  grasp,  and  a  sustaining  power,  for  its 
original  conception,  corresponding  in  grandeur  to  that  effort,  different  in 
kind,  which  must  preside  in  its  execution.  But,  after  this  highest  class,  in 
which  the  power  to  conceive  and  the  power  to  execute  are  upon  the  same 
scale  of  grandeur,  there  comes  a  second,  in  which  brilliant  powers  of  execu- 
tion, applied  to  conceptions  of  a  very  inferior  range,  are  allowed  to  establish 
a  classical  rank.  Every  literature  possesses,  besides  its  great  national  gallery, 
a  cabinet  of  minor  pieces,  not  "less  perfect  in  their  polish,  possibly  more  so. 
In  reality,  the  characteristic  of  this  class  is  elaborate  perfection — the  point 
of  inferiority  is  not  in  the  finishing,  but  in  the  compass  and  power  of  the 
original  creation,  which  (however  exquisite  in  its, class)  moves  within  a 
Biaiiller  sphere.  To  this  class  belong,  for  example,  '  The  Rape  of  the  Lock, 
that  finished  jewel  of  English  literature  ;  "The  Dunciad'  (a  still  more  ex- 
quisite gem) ;  'The  Vicar  of  Waketield'  (in  its  earlier  part):  in  German, 


48  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

He  has  been  charged  with  an  open  depreciation  of  Keats  and 
Shelley.  But  this  we  cannot  reconcile  with  his  papeis  on  these 
poets.  Without  even  giving  him  the  benefit  of  his  plea,  that  the 
papers  were  "slight  impromptus,  peremptorily  excluding  a  com- 
prehensive view  of  the  subject,"  and  disregarding  his  statement 
when  they  were  reprinted  that  "  in  the  case  of  Keats  there  is 
something  which  (after  a  lapse  of  several  years)  I  could  wish  un- 
said, or  said  more  gently,"  we  may  take  them  as  they  stand.  He 
charges  Keats  with  "  trampling  upon  his  mother-tongue  as  with 
the  hoofs  of  a  buffalo,"  and  says  of  "  Endymion  "  that  it  exhibits 
"  the  very  midsummer  madness  of  affectation,  of  false  vapoury  sen- 
timent, and  of  fantastic  effeminacy."  But  this  judgment  of  the 
earlier  poem  did  not  prevent  him  from  calling  the  "  Hyperion  " 
"  imperishable,"  and  ascribing  to  it.  "  the  majesty,  the  austere 
beauty,  and  the  simplicity  of  a  Grecian  temple  enriched  with 
Grecian  sculpture."  As  for  any  depreciation  of  Shelley,  that  I 
have  been  unable  to  find.  He  makes  fun,  in  a  kindly  spirit,  of 
Shelley's  youthful  confidence  in  waging  war  against  the  ruling 
powers,  but  at  the  same  time  he  praises  the  youth's  sincerity, 
pronounces  him  "  the  least  false  of  human  creatures,"  and  speaks 
of  "the  profound  respect  due  to  his  exalted  powers."  The  truth 
is,  that  the  charges  made  against  De  Quincey's  criticisms  are  due 
to  his  unusual  comprehensiveness  of  view  and  his  sensibility  to 
diversities  of  gifts.  He  was,  to  borrow  his  own  words,  "  a  large 
estimator  of  things  as  they  are — of  natural  gifts,  and  their  infinite 
distribution  through  an  infinite  scale  of  degrees,  and  the  com- 
pensating accomplishments  which  take  place  in  so  vast  a  variety 
of  forms."  Hence  came  numerous  misapprehensions.  Too  many 
critics,  in  his  day  no  less  than  now,  credited  their  idols  with  every 
excellence  of  composition,  every  excellence  of  head  and  heart, 
every  propriety  of  conduct  in  their  several  relations  as  superiors, 
inferiors,  and  equals.  When  De  Quincey,  who  was  never  blind 
to  a  man's  genuine  claims  to  superiority,  drew  these  claims  into 
stronger  relief  by  recording  attendant  defects,  outcries  arose  on 
every  hand  that  he  was  stealthily  undermining  established  repu- 
tations. People  refused  to  understand  that  a  writer  "  hopelessly 
inferior  in  one  talent"  could  yet  be  "vastly  superior  in  another." 

A  word  on  his  estimates  of  foreign  writers.  His  exposure  of 
weak  points  in  such  universally  established  names  as  Homer,  Plato, 
Cicero,  and  Goethe,  is  set  down  to  no  higher  motive  than  a  love  of 
paradox,  a  passion  for  inspiring  wonder.  •  Of  this  every  reader 
must  judge  for  himself.  Only  when  we  criticise  the  criticisms  of 
De  Quincey,  we  must  bear  in  mind  the  unparalleled  extent  of  his 
reading.  This  unique  preparation  for  valuing  literary  powers 
entitles  him  to  be  criticised  with  reverence  and  modesty. 

In  his  "Brief  Appraisal  of  the  Greek  Literature  in  its  foremost 


VOCABULARY.  49 

pretensions  "  (which  has  not  been  reprinted),  he  is  an  unqualified 
assertor  of  the  superiority  of  modern  to  ancient  literature.  "  It 
is,"  he  said,  "  a  pitiable  spectacle  to  any  man  of  sense  and  feeling, 
who  happens  to  be  really  familiar  with  the  golden  treasures  of  his  . 
own  ancestral  literature,  and  a  spectacle  which  moves  alternately 
scorn  and  sorrow,  to  see  young  people  squandering  their  time  and 
painful  study  upon  writers  not  fit  to  unloose  the  shoes'  latchets  of 
many  amongst  their  own  compatriots ;  making  painful  and  remote 
voyages  after  the  drossy  refuse,  when  the  pure  gold  lies  neglected 
at  their  feet."  "  We  engage  to  produce  many  scores  of  passages 
from  Chaucer,  not  exceeding  50  to  80  lines,  which  contain  more  of 
picturesque  simplicity,  more  tenderness,  more  fidelity  to  nature, 
more  felicity  of  sentiment,  more  animation  of  narrative,  and  more 
truth  of  character,  than  can  be  matched  in  all  the  Iliad  or  the 
Odyssey."  Again, — "To  our  Jeremy  Taylor,  to  our  Sir  Thomas 
Browne,  there  is  no  approach  made  in  the  Greek  elequeuce.  The 
inaugural  chapter  of  the  'Holy  Dying,'  to  say  nothing  of  many 
another  golden  passage ;  or  the  famous  passage  in  the  '  Urn 
Buriall,'  beginning,  'Now,  since  these  bones  have  rested  under 
the  drums  and  tramplings  of  three  conquests,' — have  no  parallel  in 
literature."  Finally,  "  For  the  intellectual  qualities  of  eloquence, 
in  fineness  of  understanding,  in  depth  and  in  large  compass  of 
thought,  Burke  far  surpasses  any  orator,  ancient  or  modern." 

In  another  paper,  also  excluded  from  his  collected  works,  he 
exposes  the  "  dire  affectation "  of  many  enthusiastic  admirers  of 
Greek  and  Latin  writers  : — 

"Raised  almost  to  divine  honours,  never  mentioned  but  with  affected 
rapture,  the  classics  of  Greece  and  Rome  are  seldom  read — most  of  fhem 
never ;  are  they  indeed  the  closet-companions  of  any  man  ?  Surely  it  is  t;me 
that  these  follies  were  at  an  end  ;  that  our  practice  were  made  to  square  a 
little  better  with  our  professions ;  and  that  our  pleasures  were  sincerely 
drawn  from  those  sources  in  which  we  pretend  that  they  lie." 

ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE. 

Vocabulary, 

De  Quincey  ranges  with  great  freedom  over  the  accumulated  / 
wealth  of  the  language,  his  capacious  memory  giving  him  a  pro- 
digious command  of  words.  His  range  is  perhaps  wider  than 
either  Macaulay's  or  Carlyle's,  as  lie  is  more  versatile  in  the 
"pitch"  of  his  style,  and  does  not  disdain  to  use  the  "slang"  of 
all  classes,  from  Cockney  to  Oxonian. 

In  his  diction,  taken  as  a  whole,  there  is  a. great  preponderance 
of  words  derived  from  the  Latin.  Lord  Brougham's  opinion  that 
"  the  Saxon  part  of  our  English  idiom  is  to  be  favoured  at  the 
expense  of  that  part  which  has  so  1'Appily  coalesced  from  the  Latin 

u 


50  THOMAS   DE   QUINCE Y. 

or  Greek,"  he  puts  aside  as  "  resembling  that  restraint  which  some 

metrical  writers  have  imposed  upon  themselves — of  writing  a  long 

*  copy  of  verses  from  which  some  particular  letter,  or  from  each  line 

XI    of  which   some   different   letter,   should  be   carefully  excluded." 

/From  various  causes,  he  himself  makes  an  excessive  use  of  Latin- 
ised phraseology.  Eirak-his  ear  was  deeply  enamoured  of  a  dig- 
nified rhythm ;  none  but  long  words  of  Latin  origin  were  equal 
to  the  lofty  march  of  his  periods.  Secondly,  by  the  use  of  Latin- 
ised and  quasi  technical  terms,  he  gained  greater  precision  than 
by  the  use  of  homely  words  of  looser  signification.  And  thirdly, 
it  was  part  of  his  peculiar  humuur  to  write  concerning  common 
objects  in  unfamiliar  language. 

The  strong  point  in  his  diction  is  his  acquaintance  with  the 
language  of  the  thoughts  and  feelings,  with  the  subjective  side  of 
the  English  vocabulary.  A  writer  naturally  accumulates  words 
in  the  line  of  his  strongest  interest ;  and  De  Quincey  had  a 
paramount  interest  in  the  characters,  thoughts,  and  affections 
of  man — human  nature  may  be  said  to  have  been  his  constant 
study. 

A  systematic  student  in  none  of  the  sciences,  except  perhaps 
metaphysics  and  political  economy,  he  nevertheless  had  gleaned 
technical  terms  from  every  science.  He  was  indeed  ever  on  the 
watch  for  a  good  word ;  sciences,  arts,  and  even  trades,  all  alike 
he  laid  under  greater  or  less  occasional  contributions. 

Sentences. 

Although  De  Quincey  complained  of  the  "weariness  and  re- 
pulsion "  of  the  periodic  style,  he  carried  it  to  excess  in  his  own 
composition.  His  sentences  are  stately,  elaborate,  crowded  with 
qualifying  clauses  and  parenthetical  allusions,  to  a  degree  unpar- 
alleled among  modern  writers. 

In  reviewing  Whately's  Rhetoric,  he  naturally  objected  to  the 
dogma  that  "  elaborate  stateliness  is  always  to  be  regarded  as  a 
worse  fault  than  the  slovenliness  and  languor  which  accompany  a 
very  loose  style."  He  maintained,  and  justly,  that  "  stateliness 
the  most  elaborate,  in  an  absolute  sense,  is  no  fault  at  all,  though 
it  may  be  so  in  relation  to  a  given  subject,  or  to  any  subject 
under  given  circumstances."  Whether  in  his  own  practice  he 
always  conforms  to  circumstances,  is  a  question  that  must  be  left 
to  individual  taste.  There  is  a  certain  stateliness  in  his  sentences 
under  almost  all  circumstances — a  stateliness  arising  from  his 
habitual  use  of  periodic  suspensions.  To  take  two  examples  from 
his  Sketches : — 

"  Never  in  any  equal  number  of  months  had  my  understanding  so  much 
expanded  as  during  this  visit  to  Laxtou." 


SENTENCES.  51 

When  we  throw  this  out  of  the  elaborately  periodic  form,  we,  as 
it  were,  relax  the  tension  of  the  mind,  and  destroy  the  stately 
effect.  Thus— 

"My  understanding  expanded  more  during  this  visit  to  Laxton  than 
during  any  three  months  of  my  life." 

Again — 

"  Equally,  in  fact,  as  regarded  my  physics  and  my  metaphysics  ;  in  short, 
upon  all  lines  of  advance  that  interested  my  ambition,  I  was  going  rapidly 
ahead." 

The  statement  has  a  very  different  effect  when  the  periodic  arrange- 
ment is  reversed. 

Criticism  of  single  sentences  cannot  easily  be  made  convincing, 
and  the  critic  is  apt  to  forget  the  paramount  principle  that  regard 
must  be  had  to  the  context,  to  the  nature  of  the  subject,  to  the 
effect  intended  by  the  writer.  When  a  single  sentence  is  put  upon 
its  trial,  there  are  many  casuistical  considerations  that  may  legiti- 
mately be  pleaded  by  the  counsel  for  the  defence.  Still,  if  we  try 
De  Quincey  by  his  own  rule  against  "  unwieldy  comprehensiveness," 
we  must  convict  him  of  many  violations.  In  almost  every  page 
we  find  periods  that  cannot  be  easily  comprehended  except  by  a 
mind  of  more  than  ordinary  grasp ;  and  in  many  cases  where, 
viewed  with  reference  to  the  average  capacity,  he  cannot  be  said 
to  overcrowd,  he  is  yet  upon  the  verge  of  overcrowding.  The 
following  sentence  may  be  quoted  as  one  that  stands  upon  the 
verge.  It  calls  for  a  considerable  effort  of  attention,  and  a  long 
succession  of  such  sentences  would  be  exasperating.  He  is  speak- 
ing of  his  youthful  habit  of  scrupulously  making  sure  of  the  mean- 
ing of  an  order : — 

"So  far  from  seeking  to  ' pettifogulise ' — i.e.,  to  find  evasions  for  any 
purpose  in  a  trickster's  minute  tortuosities  of  construction — exactly  in  the 
opposite  direction,  from  mere  excess  of  sincerity,  most  unwillingly  I  found, 
in  almost  everybody's  words,  an  unintentional  opening  left  for  double 
interpretations. " 

In  this  case  the  familiarity  and  the  close  connection  of  the  ideas 
makes  the  effort  of  comprehension  considerably  less.  When  the 
subject-matter  is  so  easy,  the  interspersion  of  such  periods  here 
and  there  cannot  be  called  a  fault  It  is,  on  the  contrary,  to  most 
ears  an  agreeable  relief  to  the  monotony  of  ordinary  forms  of 
sentence.  But  for  the  general  reader,  for  the  average  capacity  of 
easy  understanding,  such  sentence-forms  are  multiplied  to  an  in- 
tolerable degree  in  De  Quincey's  writing.  And  he  does  not  always 
escape  the  besetting  fault  of  long  and  crowded  sentences — in- 
tricacy. 

As  regards  the  length  and  elaboration  of  De  Quincey's  sentences, 


52  *        THOMAS   DK   QUINCEY. 

it  is  interesting  to  compare  the  first  edition  of  the  Opium  Confes- 
sions with  the  final  revision.  Many  alterations  consist  in  filling 
out  the  sentences ;  and,  in  a  good  many  cases,  two  sentences  are 
amalgamated  into  one.  Take  the  following  example,  the  first  few 
sentences  of  the  section  entitled,  "The  Pleasures  of  Opium."  In 
the  original  edition  this  stands — 

"  It  is  so  long  since  I  first  took  opium,  that  if  it  had  been  a  trifling  incident 
in  my  life,  I  might  have  forgotten  its  date ;  but  cardinal  events  are  not  to 
be  forgotten,  and  from  circumstances  connected  with  it,  I  remember  that 
it  must  be  referred  to  the  autumn  of  1804.  During  that  season  I  was  in 
London,  having  come  thither  for  the  first  time  since  my  entrance  at  col- 
lege. And  my  introduction  to  opium  arose  in  the  following  way.  From 
an  early  age  I  had  been  accustomed  to  wash  my  head  in  water  at  least  once 
a-day,"  &c. 

In  the  revised  edition  we  read — 

"  It  is  very  long  since  I  first  took  opium  ;  so  long,  that  if  it  had  been  a 
triflinc  incident  in  my  life,  I  might  have  forgotten  its  date  ;  but  cardinal 
events  are  not  to  be  forgotten,  and  from  circumstances  connected  with  it,  I 
remember  that  this  inauguration  into  the  use  of  opium  must  be  referred  to 
the  spring  or  to  the  autumn  of  1804,  during  which  seasons  I  was  in  London, 
having  come  thither  for  the  first  time  since  my  entrance  at  Oxford.  And 
this  event  arose  in  the  following  way :  From  an  early  age  I  had  been 
accustomed,"  &c. 

The  four  sentences  of  the  original  are  amalgamated  into  two, 
without  any  condensation  of  the  original  bulk.  On  the  contrary, 
additions  are  made,  one  for  the  sake  of  emphasis,  another  for  the 
sake  of  a  more  formal  connection. 

Unity  of  Sentence. — A  casuist  would  find  no  difficulty  in  arguing 
that  De  Quincey's  sentences  are  not  owr-crowded.  None  of  the 
qualifications  or  parenthetic  allusions  could  be  said  to  be  altogether 
irrelevant ;  and  the  difficulty  of  grasping  the  meaning  being  set  on 
one  side,  it  might  be  pleaded  that,  as  regards  the  main  purpose  of 
the  sentence,  and  its  place  among  the  other  sentences  of  the  com- 
position, they  are  all  of  them  indispensable. 

De  Quincey,  however,  often  offends  beyond  the  possibility  of 
justification,  overloading  his  sentences  in  a  gossiping  kind  of  way 
with  particulars  that  have  no  relevance  whatsoever  to  the  main 
statement  Of  this  habit  I  quote  two  examples,  italicising  the 
irrelevant  clauses,  and  placing  one  of  them  in  small  capitals  as 
being  an  offence  of  double  magnitude,  a  second  irrelevance  foisted 
in  upon  the  back  of  the  first.  The  first  sentence  relates  to  the  ex- 
posure of  infants  in  ancient  Greece ;  the  second  explains  itself. 

"And  because  the  ancients  had  a  scruple  (no  scruple  of  mercy  or  of 
relenting  conscience,  but  of  selfish  superstition)  as  to  taking  life  by  vio- 
lence from  any  creature  not  condemned  under  some  law,  the  mode  of  death 
must  be  by  exposure  on  the  open  hills,  where  either  the  night  air,  or  the 
fangs  of  a  wolf,  oftentimes  of  the  great  dogs — still  preserved  in  most  part* 


PARAGRAPHS.  53 

of  Greece  (and  traced  back  to  the  days  of  Homer  as  the  public  nuisances  of 
travellers) — usually  put  an  end  to  the  unoffending  creature's  life." 

"  It  is  asserted,  as  a  general  affection  of  human  nature,  that  it  is  impos- 
sible to  read  a  book  with  satisfaction  until  one  has  ascertained  whether  the 
author  of  it  be  tall  or  short,  corpulent  or  thin  ;  and,  as  to  complexion, 
whether  he  be  a  '  black '  man  (which,  in  the  '  Spectator's '  time,  was  the 
absurd  expression  for  a  swarthy  man),  or  a  fair  man,  or  a  sallow  man,  or 
perhaps  a  green  man,  which  Southey  affirmed  to  be  the  proper  description  of 
many  stout  artificers  in  Birmingham  too  much  given  to  work  in  metallic 
fumes;  ON  WHICH  ACCOUNT  THE  NAME  OF  SOUTHEY  is  AN  ABOMINATION 

TO  THIS  DAY  IN  CERTAIN   FURNACES   OF   WARWICKSHIRE." 

The  excrescences  on  the  last  sentence  might  be  justified  on  the 
ground  that  they  are  humorous,  although  in  severe  exposition  the 
humour  would  probably  be  ill-timed ;  but  the  parenthetic  informa- 
tion in  the  first  is  pedantic,  and  insufferably  out  of  harmony  with 
the  rest  of  the  sentence.  Still  even  for  this  a  casuist  might  find 
something  to  say,  taking  the  parenthesis  in  relation  to  the  subject- 
matter  and  De  Quincey's  pitch  of  feeling  in  the  treatment  of  it. 

Paragraph. 

We  have  seen  in  our  Introduction  that  De  Quincey  studied 
"  the  philosophy  of  transition  and  connection."  He  is  scrupu- 
lously elaborate,  almost  too  elaborate,  in  explaining  the  point  of 
his  statements. 

No  quotation  can  be  made  from  De  Quincey  that  does  not 
exemplify  this.  Still  the  analysis  of  a  short  passage  may  help 
to  put  the  student  upon  the  proper  track  for  seeing  how  large 
a  part  of  his  composition  is  taken  up  with  phrases  of  connec- 
tion : — 

"So  it  will  always  be.  Those  who  (like  Madame  Dacier)  possess  no 
accomplishment  but  Greek,  will  of  necessity  set  a  superhuman  value  upon 
that  literature  in  all  its  parts,  to  which  their  own  narrow  skill  becomes  an 
available  key." 

The  expressions  in  italics  are  all  connective.  A  rapid  writer,  such 
as  Macaulay,  would  have  omitted  "  like  Madame  Dacier,"  and  in 
place  of  the  connective  periphrasis  at  the  end,  would  have  said 
briefly  and  pointedly  "  Greek  literature,"  leaving  the  reader  to 
pass  on  without  the  labour  of  formally  comprehending  the  con- 
nection. To  continue : — 

"  Besides  that,  over  and  above  this  coarse  and  conscious  motive  for  over- 
rating that  which  reacts  with  an  equal  and  answerable  overrating  upon  their 
own  little  philological  attainments,  there  is  another  agency  at  work,  and 
quite  unconsciously  to  the  subjects  of  that  agency,  in  disturbing  the  sanity 
of  any  estimate  they  may  make  of  a  foreign  literature." 

This  sentence  is  wholly  connective,  joining  together  the  two  in- 


54  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

ducements  to  overrate  the  value  of   a  foreign  literature  —  the 
second  being  stated  as  follows : — 

"  It  is  the  habit  (well  known  to  psychologists)  of  transferring  to  anything 
ereated  by  our  own  skill,  or  which  reflects  our  own  skill,  as  if  it  lay  causatively 
and  objectively  in  the  reflecting  thing  itself,  that  pleasurable  power  which  in 
very  truth  belongs  subjectively  to  the  mind  of  him  who  surveys  it,  from  con- 
scious success  in  the  exercise  of  his  own  energies.  Hence  it  is  that  we  see 
daily  without  surprise  young  ladies  hanging  enamoured  over  the  pages  of  an 
Italian  author,  and  calling  attention  to  trivial  commonplaces,  such  as,  clothed 
in  plain  mother  English,  would  have  been  more  repulsive  to  them  than  the 
distinctions  of  a  theologian  or  the  counsels  of  a  great-grandmother.  They 
mistake  for  a  pleasure  yielded  by  the  author  what  is  in  fact  the  pleasure 
attending  their  own  success  in  mastering  what  was  lately  an  insuperable 
difficulty." 

This  explicitness  of  connection  is  the  chief  merit  of  De  Quincey's 
paragraphs.  He  cannot  be  said  to  observe  any  other  principle. 
He  is  carried  into  violations  of  all  the  other  rules  by  his  inveter- 
ate habit  of  digression.  Often  upon  a  mere  casual  suggestion  he 
branches  off  into  a  digression  of  several  pages,  sometimes  even 
digressing  from  the  subject  of  his  first  digression.  The  enormity 
of  these  offences  is  a  good  deal  palliated  by  his  being  conscious 
that  he  is  digressing,  and  his  taking  care  to  let  us  know  when  he 
strikes  off  from  the  main  subject  and  when  he  returns.  Some  of 
his  papers  are  professedly  "  discursive,"  especially  the  '  Autobio- 
graphic Sketches.' 

The  following  is  an  example  of  his  way  of  apologising  for  a 
digression.  It  illustrates,  at  the  same  time,  his  capital  excel- 
lence of  explicit  connection.  In  a  paper  professedly  on  Demos- 
thenes, he  comes  across  Lord  Brougham's  Rectorial  Address  at 
Glasgow,  and  at  once,  leaving  Demosthenes,  proceeds  to  discuss 
several  things  mentioned  in  the  address.  At  the  close  of  this 
excursus  he  says  : — 

"  I  have  used  my  privilege  of  discursiveness  to  step  aside  from  Demos- 
thenes to  another  subject,  not  otherwise  connected  with  the  Attic  orator  than, 
first,  by  the  common  reference  of  both  subjects  to  rhetoric  ;  but,  secondly, 
by  the  accident  of  having  been  jointly  discussed  by  Lord  Brougham  in  a 
paper  which  (though  now  forgotten)  obtained  at  the  moment  most  undue 
celebrity." 

The  apology,  however,  becomes  the  occasion  of  another  offence. 
Before  returning  to  Demosthenes,  he  throws  in  a  few  sentences 
of  comment  on  the  fact  that  in  England  the  utterances  of  eminent 
public  men  on  subjects  beyond  their  province  and  their  acquire 
ments  are  received  with  a  deference  not  accorded  to  men  "  speaking 
under  the  known  privilege  of  professional  knowledge." 

Should  these  digressions,  obviously  breaches  of  strict  method, 
be  imitated  or  avoided  1  The  experienced  writer  will  please  him- 
self, and  consult  the  effect  that  he  intends  to  produce.  But  if  he 


FIGURES   OF  SPEECH.  55 

digresses  after  the  model  of  De  Quincey,  he  may  rest  assured  that 
he  will  be  accused  of  affectation,  and  will  offend  all  that  read  for 
direct  information  concerning  the  subject  in  hand, 

Figures  of  Speech. 

De  Quincey  may  be  described  as  a  very  "  tropical "  writer  (see 
INTRODUCTION  p.  13).     He  uses  comparatively  few  formal  simili- 
tudes, but  his  pages  are  thickly  strewn  with  "  tropes,"  with  meta-  '' 
phors,  personifications,  synecdoches,  and  metonymies. 

His  most  characteristic  and  peculiar  figure  is  personification. 
He  makes  a  constant  practice  of  applying  predicates  to  names  of 
inanimate  things,  and  even  to  abstract  nouns,  as  if  they  were  names 
of  living  agents. 

This  mannerism  pervades  all  De  Quincey's  writings,  and  is  so 
characteristic  that  we  at  once  think  of  him  when  we  find  it  appear- 
ing strongly  in  another  writer.  A  few  examples  give  but  a  faint 
impression  compared  with  what  we  receive  when  we  read  his  vol- 
umes and  meet  with  an  example  in  every  other  sentenca  It  is 
peculiarly  striking  in  the  case  of  abstract  nouns — above  all,  when 
one  abstraction  is  represented  as  acting  upon  another ;  thus — 

"Here  I  had  terminated  this  chapter  as  at  a  natural  pause,  which,  while 
shutting  out  for  ever  my  eldest  brother  from  the  reader's  sight  and  from 
my  own,  necessarily  at  the  same  moment  worked  a  permanent  revolution  in 
the  character  of  my  daily  life.  Two  such  changes,  and  both  so  abrupt,  in- 
dicated imperiously  the  close  of  one  era  and  the  opening  of  another.  The 
advantages,  indeed,  which  my  brother  had  over  me  in  years,  in  physical 
activities  of  every  kind,  in  decision  of  purpose,  and  in  energy  of  will — all 
which,  advantages,  besides,  borrowed  a  ratification  from  an  obscure  sense,  on 
my  part,  of  duty  as  incident  to  what  seemed  an  appointment  of  Providence 
— inevitably  had  controlled,  and  for  years  to  come  would  have  controlled, 
the  free  spontaneous  movements  of  a  dreamer  like  myself." 

This  treatment  of  abstractions  as  living  agents  may  be  studied  also 
in  the  following  passage,  concerning  the  civilising  influence  of 
Athens  through  her  theatre: — 

"  But  if  it  were  a  vain  and  arrogant  assumption  to  illuminate,  as  regarded 
those  primal  truths  which,  like  the  stars,  are  hung  aloft,  and  shine  for  all 
alike,  neither  vain  nor  arrogant  was  it  to  fly  her  falcons  at  game  almost  as 
high.  If  not  life,  yet  light ;  if  not  absolute  birth,  yet  moral  regeneration 
and  fructifying  warmth — these  were  quickening  forces  which  abundantly 
she  was  able  to  engraft  upon  truths  else  slumbering  and  inert.  Not  affect- 
ing to  teach  the  new,  she  could  yet  vivify  the  old.  Those  moral  echoes, 
so  solemn  and  pathetic,  that  lingered  in  the  ear  from  her  stately  tragedies, 
all  spoke  with  the  authority  of  voices  from  the  grave.  The  great  phantoms 
that  crossed  her  stage,  all  pointed  with  shadowy  fingers  to  shattered  dynas- 
ties and  the  ruins  of  once  regal  houses,  Pelopidse  or  Labdacidae,  as  monu- 
ments of  sufferings  in  expiation  of  violated  morals,  or  sometimes — which 
even  more  thrilliugly  spoke  to  human  sensibilities — of  guilt  too  awful  to  be 


56  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

expiated.  And  in  the  midst  of  these  appalling  records,  what  is  their  ulti- 
mate solution  ?  From  what  key-note  does  Athenian  Tragedy  trace  the  ex- 
pansion of  its  own  dark  impassioned  music?  "T£piy  (hybris) — the  spirit  of 
outrage  coupled  with  the  spirit  of  insult  and  arrogant  self-assertion — in  that 
temper  lurks  the  original  impulse  towards  wrong ;  and  to  that  temper  the 
Greek  drama  adapts  its  monitory  legends.  The  doctrine  of  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures  as  to  vicarious  retribution  is  at  times  discovered  secretly  moving 
through  the  scenic  poetry  of  Athens.  His  own  crime  is  seen  hunting  a 
man  through  five  generations,  and  finding  him  finally  in  the  persons  of  hia 
innocent  descendants." 

The  tropical  applying  of  abstractions  to  words  expressing  move- 
ment— see  in  the  above  passage  "  lurking,"  "  moving,"  "  hunting," 
&c. — is  a  prominent  De  Quinceyism.  Ideas  "  lurk  under  "  terms ; 
distinctions  "  move  obscurely  "  in  the  minds  of  men  ;  revolutions 
"  travel  leisurely  through  their  stages ; "  "  the  guardianship  of 
civilisation  suddenly  unfolds  itself  like  a  banner  "  over  particular 
nations ;  a  danger  "  approaches  and  wheels  away — threatens,  but 
finally  forbears  to  strike,"  &c.  <kc. 

The  Sources  of  his  Similitudes. — De  Quincey's  similitudes  are 
drawn  from  an  immense  sphere  of  reading  and  observation.  With- 
"but  pretending  to  be  exhaustive,  we  may  mention  separately  some 

!  of  his  principal  fields. 

r-1'  (i.)  The  characteristics  of  lower  animals.  He  very  often  en- 
livens an  adjective  of  quality  by  appending  a  comparison  to  some 
animal  possessing  the  quality  in  an  extreme  form.  We  are  con- 
stantly meeting  such  phrases  as  "  restless  as  a  hyena ; "  "  rare  as  a 
phoenix ; "  "  by  original  constitution  strong  as  one  of  Meux's  dray- 
horses  ; "  "  Burke,  a  hunting  leopard,  coupled  with  Schlosser,  a 
German  poodle."  In  owning  himself  baffled  to  find  any  illustra- 
tion of  Richter's  activity  of  understanding,  he  shows  how  deliber- 
ately he  ransacked  his  knowledge  in  pursuit  of  similitudes : — 

"What  then  is  it  that  I  claim?  Briefly,  an  activity  of  understanding  so 
restless  and  indefatigable  that  all  attempts  to  illustrate,  or  express  it  ade- 
quately, by  images  borrowed  from  the  natural  world,  from  the  motions  of 
beasts,  birds,  insects,  &o.,  from  the  leaps  of  tigers  or  leopards,  from  the 
gambolling  and  tumbling  of  kittens,  the  antics  of  monkeys,  or  the  running 
of  antelopes  and  ostriches,  &c.,  are  baffled,  confounded,  and  made  ridiculous 
by  the  enormous  and  overmastering  superiority  of  impression  left  by  the 
thing  illustrated." 

(2.)  Works  of  travel  A  great  reader  of  books  of  travel,  he 
found  in  the  customs  and  natural  phenomena  of  foreign  countries 
extreme  examples,  and  thus  was  able  to  give  to  his  similes  a  pecu- 
liar finish,  and  at  times  an  independent  value,  such  as  attaches  to 
some  of  the  similes  of  Milton.  Where  for  an  image  of  hopeful 
change  a  less  accomplished  artist  would  simply  make  comparison 
to  the  opening  of  spring,  De  Quincey  is  able  to  cite  the  opening  of 
spring  in  Sweden,  and  dwells  upon  a  gorgeous  picture  of  the  sud- 


FIGURES   OF  SPEECH.  57 

den  vernal  outburst  in  that  country.  An  unfinished  book  that 
another  would  compare  simply  to  an  unfinished  building,  he  com- 
pares to  "  a  Spanish  bridge  or  aqueduct  begun  upon  too  great  a 
scale  for  the  resources  of  the  architect ; "  opening  up  remote  col- 
lateral reflections  to  the  reader  that  has  time  to  pause  and  consider. 
Again,  illustrating  how  soon  we  forget  the  features  of  dead  or  dis- 
tant friends,  he  says — 


"The  faces  of  infants,  though  they  are  divine  as  flowers  on  a  savanna  of 
Texas,  or  as  the  carolling  of  birds  in  a  forest,  are,  like  flowers  in  a  savanna 
of  Texas,  or  the  carolling  of  birds  in  a  forest,  soon  overtaken  by  the  pur- 
suing darkness  that  swallows  up  all  things  human." 

Again— 

' '  Yes,  reader,  countless  are  the  mysterious  handwritings  of  grief  or  joy 
which  have  inscribed  themselves  successively  upon  the  palimpsest  of  your 
brain  ;  and  like  the  annual  leaves  of  aboriginal  forests,  or  the  undissolving 
snows  on  the  Himalaya,  or  light  falling  upon  light,  the  endless  strata  have 
covered  up  each  other  in  forgetfulness. 

Once  more — 

".  .  .  'the  anarchy  of  dreams'  presides  in  German  philosophy ;  and  the 
restless  elements  of  opinion,  throughout  every  region  of  debate,  mould  them- 
selves eternally,  like  the  billowy  sands  of  the  desert,  as  beheld  by  Bruce, 
into  towering  columns,  soar  upwards  to  a  giddy  altitude,  then  stalk  about 
for  a  minute,  all  aglow  with  fiery  colour,  and  finally  unniould  and  'dis- 
limn,'  with  a  collapse  as  sudden  as  the  motions  of  that  eddying  breeze 
under  which  their  vapoury  architecture  had  arisen." 

This  last  image  was  a  favourite  with  him.  He  first  used  it  in 
the  article  on  Dr  Parr : — 

"The  brief  associations  of  public  carriages  or  inns  are  as  evanescent  as 
the  sandy  columns  of  the  Great  Desert,  which  the  caprices  of  the  wind  build 
up  and  scatter,  shape  and  unshape,  within  the  brief  revolution  of  a  minute." 

He  used  it  again  in  the  preface  to  his  '  Political  Economy ' : — 

"...  or,  like  the  fantastic  architecture  which  the  winds  are  everlast- 
ingly pursuing  in  the  Arabian  desert,  would  exhibit  phantom  arrays  of 
fleeting  columns  and  fluctuating  edifices,  which,  under  the  very  breath  that 
had  created  them,  would  be  for  ever  collapsing  into  dust." 

(3.)  He  very  often  compares  individuals  to  celebrated  person- 
ages in  literature,  by  a  kind  of  synecdoche.  One  specimen  must 
suffice : — 

"Here  at  this  time  was  living  Mr  Olarkson, — that  son  of  thunder,  that 
Titan,  who  was,  in  fact,  the  one  great  Atlas  that  bore  up  the  Slave  Trade 
Abolition  cause — now  resting  from  his  mighty  labours  and  nerve-shattering 
perils." 

(4.)  The  feats  of  magic  furnish  him  with  several  expressions  of 
astonishment.  " Thaumaturgic "  is  a  favourite  word;  he  speaks 
of  the  "  rhabdomantic  "  power  of  Christianity  in  evoking  dormant 


58  THOMAS  DE   QUINCEY. 

feelings;  and  he  compares  the  transformation  worked  by  a  lady 
upon  her  husband  to  the  achievements  of  "  some  mighty  caliph  or 
lamp-bearing  Aladdin." 

(5.)  From  music  he  draws  some  very  favourite  metaphors. 
Thus :  He  knows  "  human  despondencies  through  all  their  in- 
finite gamut."  Christopher  North  at  Oxford  "enjoyed  an  unlim- 
,j  ited  favour  with  an  infinite  gamut  of  friends  and  associates,  run- 
ning through  every  key,  the  diapason  closing  full  in  groom,  cobbler, 
and  stable-boy."  Ceylon  is  "  a  panorganon  for  modulating  through 
tJie  whole  diatonic  scale  of  climates." 

(6.)  He  takes  many  metaphors  from  the  technical  language  of 
law  and  trada  The  question  as  to  the  comparative  value  of  an- 
cient and  modern  learning  is  "  the  great  pending  suit  between 
antiquity  and  ourselves."  "Such  as  these  were  the  habits  and 
the  reversionary  consolations  of  Pompey."  "The  other  historic 
,  person  on  whom  I  shall  probably  be  charged  with  assault  and 
."  battery  is  Josephus."  "The  Jew  did  not  receive  the  bribe  first 
and  then  perpetrate  the  treason,  but  trusted  to  Roman  good  faith 
at  three  months  after  date."  Writing  of  Pope's  composing  satire  at 
the  instigation  of  Warburton,  he  says : — 

"  To  enter  a  house  of  hatred  as  a  junior  partner,  and  to  take  the  stock  of 
malice  at  a  valuation  (we  copy  from  advertisements),  that  is  an  ignoble  act, " 

These  metaphors  are  very  often  humorous.     Thus — 

"A  Canadian  winter  for  my  money  ;  or  a  Russian  one,  where  every  man 
is  but  a  co-proprietor  with  the  north  wind,  in  the. fee-simple  of  his  own 
ears. " 

(7.)  Sometimes  he  takes  a  fancy  to  draw  upon  mathematics, 
medicine,  or  physical  science.  Thus — 

"As  to  Symmons,  he  was  a  Whig ;  and  his  covert  purpose  was  to  secure 
Milton  for  his  own  party,  before  that  party  was  fully  secreted  by  the  new 
tendencies  beginning  to  move  amongst  the  partisanships  of  the  age.  Until 
Dr  Sacheverel  came,  in  Queen  Anne's  reign,  the  crystallisations  of  "Whig 
and  Tory  were  rudimental  and  incomplete.  Symmoiis,  therefore,  was  under 
a  bias,  and  a  morbid  kind  of  deflection." 

How  far  he  observes  the  conditions  of  effective  comparison. — 
De  Quincey  is  a  model  of  exact  comparison.  To  point  out  with 
deliberate — some  would  say  with  tedious — scrupulosity  the  re- 
sembling circumstances  in  the  things  compared,  peculiarly  suits 
his  subtilising  turn  of  mind.  He  never  seems  to  be  in  a  hurry, 
and  does  not  aspire  to  hit  off  a  similitude  in  a  few  pregnant 
words ;  his  characteristic  is  punctilious-  accuracy,  regardless  of 
expense  in  the  matter  of  words. 

Out  of  numerous  available  examples  may  be  quoted  his  com- 
parison of  the  distribution  of  men  in  Ceylon  to  the  distribution 
of  material  in  a  peach : — 


FIGURES   OF   SPEECH.  59 

"But  strange  indeed,  where  everything  seems  strange,  is  the  arrange- 
ment of  the  Ceylonese  territory  and  people.  Take  a  peach  :  what  you  call 
the  flesh  of  the  peach,  the  substance  which  you  eat,  is  massed  orbicularly 
round  a  central  stone — often  as  large  as  a  pretty  large  strawberry.  Now, 
in  Ceylon  the  central  di&trict,  answering  to  this  peach-stone,  constitutes  a 
fierce  little  Lilliputian  kingdom,  quite  independent,  through  many  centuries, 
of  the  lazy  belt,  the  peach-flesh,  which  swathes  and  enfolds  it,  and  perfectly 
distinct  by  the  character  and  origin  of  its  population.  The  peach-stone  is 
called  Kandy,  and  the  people  Kandyans." 

Seeing  that  he  possessed  an  extraordinary  power  of  "  elevating  " 
by  means  of  similitudes,  it  is  natural  to  ask  whether  he  is  ever 
guilty  of  undue  exaggeration.  When  this  question  is  put  con- 
cerning De  Quincey,  attention  turns  at  once  to  his  Opium  Con- 
fessions and  his  'Autobiographic  Sketches.'  In  these  works  he 
describes  his  own  feelings  in  metaphors  taken  from  the  language 
of  the  great  operations  of  Nature,  and  draws  elaborate  comparisons 
between  momentous  epochs  in  his  own  life,  and  such  imposing 
phenomena  as  the  uncontrollable  migrations  of  the  buffalo  herds. 
Are  these  similitudes  extravagantly  hyperbolical  ?  Do  they  offend 
the  reader  as  rising  extravagantly  above  the  dignity  of  the  sub- 
ject 1  Much  depends  upon  our  point  of  view.  If  we  view  the 
autobiographer  unsympathetically,  from  the  stand-point  of  our  own 
personality — if  we  regard  him  simply  as  a  unit  among  the  millions 
of  mankind,  a  speck  upon  "the  great  globe  itself," — we  shall 
undoubtedly  be  shocked  at  his  venturing  to  compare  revolutions 
within  his  own  insignificant  being  to  revolutions  affecting  vast 
regions  of  the  earth.  But  if  we  view  him  as  he  means  that 
we  should  view  him,  sympathetically,  from  the  stand-point  of 
his  personality,  we  shall  not  be  shocked  at  the  audacity  of  his 
similitudes — we  shall  not  consider  them  extravagant,  or  out  of 
keeping  with  the  feelings  proper  to  the  occasion.  Epochs  and 
incidents  in  our  own  life  are  more  important  to  us,  bulk  more 
largely  in  our  eyes,  than  epochs  and  incidents  in  the  history  of 
a  nation.  The  violent  death  of  a  near  and  dear  relative  or  friend 
touches  us  more  profoundly  than  an  earthquake  at  Lisbon,  a 
massacre  at  Cawnpore,  or  a  revolution  in  Paris.  De  Qnincey 
says  nothing  that  has  not  been  felt  more  or  less  dimly  by  all 
human  beings  when  he  says,  that  on  his  entering  Oxford  the 
profound  public  interest  concerning  the  movements  of  Napoleon 
"  a  little  divided  with  me  the  else  monopolising  awe  attached  to 
Hie  solemn  act  of  launching  myself  upon  the  world," 

Concerning  the  novelty  or  originality  of  his  similitudes.  He 
has  never  been  accused  of  plagiarising.  When  he  borrows  a 
figure  of  speech,  he  gives  a  formal  acknowledgement ;  at  least 
he  does  so  in  some  cases,  and  I  have  never  seen  any  clandestine 
appropriations  charged  against  him.  "As  I  have  never  allowed 
myself,"  he  says,  "  to  covet  any  man's  ox,  nor  his  ass,  nor  any- 


60  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

,  thing  that  is  his,  still  less  would  it  become  a  philosopher  to  covet 
other  people's  images  or  metaphors."  And  if  he  had,  we  might 
say,  as  he  said  of  Coleridge's  plagiarisms,  that  such  robbery  would 
have  been  an  honour  to  the  person  robbed.  We  may  be  sure, 
from  the  unique  finish  of  his  similitudes,  that  the  stolen  property 
would  have  improved  in  value  under  his  hands. 

QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity, 

De  Quincey  cannot  be  ranked  among  simple  writers.  His  style 
has  certain  elements  of  simplicity,  but,  at  the  same  time,  it  has, 
in  a  considerable  degree,  every  element  of  abstruseness  specified  in 
a  manual  of  composition, 

(i.)  He  makes  an  excessive  use  of  Latinised,  scholarly,  and 
technical  terms.  Thus — 

"  I  myself,  who  have  never  been  a  great  wine- drinker,  used  to  find  that 
half-a-dozen  glasses  of  wine  advantageously  affected  the  faculties,  brightened 
and  intensified  the  consciousness,  and  gave  to  the  mind  a  feeling  of  being 
'ponderibus  librata  suis. '  " 

Concerning  his  '  Logic  of  Political  Economy,'  Mr  M'Culloch  says 
— "  It  would  have  been  more  popular  and  successful  had  it  been 
less  scholastic.  It  is  right  to  be  logical,  but  not  to  be  perpet- 
ually obtruding  logical  forms  and  technicalities  on  the  reader's 
attention." 

(2.)  In  his  choice  of  subjects  he  prefers  the  recondite— offering, 
in  this  respect,  a.  great  contrast  to  Macaulay. 

In  his  Essays  "  addressed  to  the  understanding  as  an  insulated 
faculty,"  he  runs  after  the  most  abstruse  problems.  Take  the 
examples  quoted  in  his  preface  to  the  first  volume  of  his  '  Collected 
Works.'  In  the  "  Essenes,"  he  defends  a  new  speculation  on  a 
puzzling  subject  with  considerations  familiar  only  to  archseologic 
theologians.  In  his  "  Caesars,"  his  purpose  is  not  so  much  a 
condensed  narrative  as  an  elucidation  of  doubtful  points.  His 
"  Essay  on  Cicero "  deals  with  problems  of  the  same  nature. 
And  so  with  many  others  of  his  articles.  The  volume  on  '  Leaders 
in  Literature,'  wherever  it  keeps  faithful  to  its  title,  is  taken  up 
mainly  with  the  "traditional  errors  affecting  them."  Even  his 
'Autobiographic  Sketches'  turn  aside  upon  various  incidents  to 
the  pursuit  of  subtle  speculations,  such  as  disquisitions  on  the 
possible  issues  of  an  action,  recondite  analysis  and  conjecture  of 
motives,  consideration  of  delicate  points  of  taste,  nice  investiga- 
tion of  the  sources  of  the  influence  of  a  poem  or  a  picture.  His 
'  Logic  of  Political  Economy '  deals  with  the  most  puzzling  and 
abstruse  principles  of  the  science. 


SIMPLICITY.  61 

-N    ^ 
(3.)  So  far  from  shirking — as  is  the  manner  of  simple  writers 

— every  call  to  modify  a  bare  assertion,  he  revels  in  nice  dis- 
tinctions and  scrupulous  qualifications.  This  is  a  part  of  his 
exactness.  « 

(4.)  We  have  already  noticed  his  excessive  use  of  abstract  terms 
and  forms  of  expression.  What  we  exemplified  as  his  favourite 
figure  is  not  good  for  rapid  perusal.  When  a  transaction  is 
represented  as  taking  place,  not  between  living  agents,  but  be- 
tween abstract  qualities  of  those  agents,  a  mode  of  statement  so 
unfamiliar  is  not  to  be  comprehended  without  a  considerable  effort 
of  thought. 

(5.)  His  general  structure  is  not  simple.     Long  periods,  each  !) 
embodying  a  flock  of  clauses,  are  abstruse  reading.      Even  his 
explicitness  of  connection  has  not  its  full  natural  effect  of  mak- 
ing the  effort  of  comprehension  easy.     He  connects  his  statements 
with  such  exactness  that  the  explicitness  becomes  a  burden. 

Certain  things  may  be  said  iu  extenuation  of  this  neglect  of  the 
ordinary  means  of  simplicity. 

I.  With  all  his  abstruseness  he  does  observe  certain  points  of  a 
simple  style. 

(i.)  He  often  repeats  in  simpler  language  what  he  has  said  with 
characteristic  abstractness  of  phrase.  Thus,  in  the  case  of  his 
cardinal  distinction  between  the  literature  of  knowledge  and  the 
literature  of  power — 

"  In  that  great  social  organ  which,  collectively,  we  call  literature,  there 
may  be  distinguished  two  separate  offices  that  may  blend,  and  often  do  so, 
but  capable,  severally,  of  a  severe  insulation,  and  naturally  fitted  for  re-        ^ 
ciprocal  repulsion.     There  is,  first,  the  literature  of  knowledge;  and  secondly,    {/ 
the  literature  of  power.     The  function  of  the  first  is  to  teach  ;  the  function  . 
of  the  second  is  to  move.     The  first  is  a  rudder ;  the  second,  an  oar  or  u  j 
8ail.»  ^ 

(2.)  In  dealing  with  dates  and  statistics,  he  has  a  commendable 
habit  of  devising  helps  to  the  reader's  memory  by  means  of  familiar  '  ^ 
comparisons.     Thus — 

"ThW'was  in  1644,  the  year  of  Marston  Moor,  and  the  penultimate  year 
of  the  Parliamentary  war." 

Again —  * 

"Glasgow  has  as  many  thousands  of  inhabitants  as  there  are  days  in  the 
year.  (I  so  state  the  population  in  order  to  assist  the  reader's  memory.)" 

In  like  manner  he  helps  us  to  remember  the  territorial  extent 
and  the  population  of  Ceylon  by  a  comparison  with  Ireland  and 
Scotland. 

(3.)  A  characteristic  figure  with  him  is  a  figure  taken  from 
simple  movements  : — 


62  THOMAS  DE   QUINCEY. 

t\    j 

\y     "This  growth  of  intellect,  outrunning  the  capacities  of  the  physical 

'  structure;"    "by  night  he  succeeded  in  reaching  the  farther  end  of  his 
.'     duties;"   "he  walked  conscientiously  through   the  services  of  the  day." 
"  Extraordinary  erudition,  even  though  travelling  into  obscure  and  sterile 
fields,  has  its  own  pecultar  interest.     And  about  Dr  Parr,  moreover,  there 
circled  another  and  far  different  interest." 

It  must,  however,  be  admitted  that  such  forms  of  expression, 
though  intrinsically  simple,  are  abstruse  to  the  majority  from  not 
being  familiar. 

II.  His  technical  terms  can  often  justify  their  existence  on  the 
plea  that  they  give  greater  precision.  Thus — 

"There  was  a  prodigious  ferment  in  the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth 
rjtnry.     In  the  earlier  bisection  of  the  second  half  there  was  a  general 
settling  or  deposition  from  this  ferment." 


So  in  giving  the  dimensions  of  the  famous  Ceylon  pillar — 

"The  pillar  measures  six  feet  by  six — i.e.,  thirty-six  square  feet — on  the 
flat  quadrangular  tablet  of  its  upper  horizontal  surface. " 

Once  more,  writing  of  the  impossibility  of  translating  certain 
words  by  any  single  word,  he  says — 

"To  take  an  image  from  the  language  of  eclipses,  the  correspondence 
between  the  disk  of  the  original  word  and  its  translated  representative  is,  in 
thousands  of  instances,  not  annular;  the  centres  do  not  coincide  ;  the  words 
overlap." 

In  all  these  cases  there  is  no  denying  that  the  expression  ia 
superlatively  precise,  although  perhaps  all  the  precision  required 
under  the  circumstances  might  have  been  given  in  more  familiar 
language. 

Such  are  some  of  the  circumstances  that  compensate  his  ab- 
etruseness.  Imitators  should  see  that  they  make  equal  compen- 
sation. The  assertion  may  be  hazarded  that  writers  aiming  at 
wide  popularity  are  not  safe  to  use  so  much  abstruse  language  as 
De  Quincey,  whatever  may  be  their  powers  of  compensating. 

Clearness. 

Perspicuity. — To  readers  that  find  no  difficulty  in  the  abstruse- 
ness  of  his  diction,  De  Quincey  is  tolerably  perspicuous.  His 
virtues  in  this  respect  are  summed  up  in  the  capital  excellence  of 
his  paragraphs,  explicitness  of  connection.  If  we  find  his  diction 
easy,  he  is  so  scrupulous  in  keeping  before  us  the  general  arrange- 
ment of  his  composition,  as  well  as  the  bearing  of  particular  state- 
ments, and  even,  as  we  have  seen,  of  his  numerous  digressions, 
that  we  are  seldom  in  danger  of  confusion. 

Exactness,  however,  rather  than  perspicuity,  is  his  peculiar 
merit  On  this  he  openly  prides  himself.  In  an  article  on  Ceylon, 


CLEARNESS.  63 

having  said  that  a  young  officer,  marching  with  a  small  body  of 
men  through  the  island,  took  Kandy  in  his  route,  he  appends  a 
footnote  to  the  word  "  took  "  : — 

"This  phrase  is  equivocal ;  it  bears  two  senses — the  traveller's  sense  and 
the  soldier's.  But  we  rarely  make  such  errors  in  the  use  of  words ;  the 
error  is  original  in  the  government  documents  themselves. " 

He  certainly  had  reason  to  glory.  None  of  our  writers  in 
general  literature  have  shown  themselves  so  scrupulously  precise. 
His  works  are  still  the  crowning  delicacy  for  lovers  of  formal, 
punctilious  exactness.1 

Of  this  exactness  we  have  already  given  several  illustrations. 
We  have  illustrated  the  exactness  of  his  comparisons,  and  the  fact 
that  he  often  purchases  exactness  at  the  price  of  simplicity.  Ref- 
erence may  also  be  made  to  the  account  of  his  opinions  and  the 
passage  there  quoted. 

His  minuteness  in  modifying  vague  general  expressions  is  par- 
ticularly worthy  of  notice,  and,  when  not  pushed  to  a  pedantic 
extreme,  worthy  of  imitation.  He  seldom  says  that  a  thing  is 
remarkable  without  adding  in  what  respects.  A  man's  life  is 
"  notable  in  two  points ; "  has  "  two  separate  claims  upon  our 
notice : " — 

"A  man  of  original  genius,  shown  to  us  as  revolving  through  the  leisurely 
stages  of  a  biographical  memoir,  lays  open,  to  readers  prepared  for  such 
revelations,  two  separate  theatres  of  interest ;  one  in  his  personal  career,  the 
other  in  his  works  and  his  intellectual  development. " 

In  like  manner,  "  that  sanctity  which  settles  on  the  memory  of 
a  great  man,  ought,  upon  a  double  motive,  to  be  vigilantly  sustained 
by  his  countrymen."  When  he  predicates  a  superlative,  he  is  ex- 
emplarily  scrupulous  to  let  us  know  what  particulars  it  applies  to. 
Aristotle's  Ehetoric  is  "  the  best,  as  regards  the  primary  purpose 
of  the  teacher ;  though  otherwise,  for  elegance,"  &c.  Jeremy  Taylor 
and  Sir  T.  Browne  are  "undoubtedly  the  richest,  the  most  dazzling, 
and,  with  reference  to  their  matter,  the  most  captivating  of  all 
rhetoricians."  When  he  puts  the  question,  "Was  Caesar,  upon 
the  whole,  the  greatest  of  men  ? "  he  does  not  at  once  pronounce 
roundly  "Yes"  or  "No."  He  first  explains  in  what  sense  he 
means  great : — 

"Was  Csesar,  upon  the  whole,  the  greatest  of  men?  We  restrict  the 
question,  of  course,  to  the  classes  of  men  great  in  action;  great  by  the  extent 


1  With  a  legitimate  feeling  of  his  own  innocence,  he  often  censures  the  lax 
practice  of  other  writers.  He  is  angry  with  Dr  Johnson  for  not  further  explain- 
ing what  he  meant  by  calling  Pope  "  the  most  correct  of  'poets  "  "  Correctness," 
he  exclaims,  "in  what?  Think  of  the  admirable  qualifications  for  settling  the 
scale  of  such  critical  distinctions  which  that  man  must  have  had  who  turned  out 
upon  this  vast  world  the  single  oracular  word  '  correctness '  to  shift  for  itself, 
and  explain  its  own  meaning  to  all  generati 


64  THOMAS   DK  QUINCEY. 

of  their  Influence  over  their  social  contemporaries  ;  great  by  th/owlng  open 
avenues  to  extended  powers  that  previously  had  been  closed  ;  great  by  mak- 
ing obstacles  one.)  vast  to  become  trivial ;  or  prizes  that  once  were  trivial  to 
be  glorified  by  expansion." 

As  an  example  of  this  "  pettif ogulising "  on  the  larger  scale, 
we  may  quote  his  footnote  on  the  maxim  "  De  mortuis  nil  nisi 
bonum  " : — 

"  This  famous  canon  of  charity  (Concerning  the  dead,  let  us  have  nothing 
but  what  is  kind  and  favourable)  has  furnished  an  inevitable  occasion  for 
much  doubtful  casuistry.  The  dead,  as  those  pre-eminently  unable  to  defend 
themselves,  enjoy  a  natural  privilege  of  indulgence  amongst  the  generous 
and  considerate  ;  but  not  to  the  extent  which  this  sweeping  maxim  would 
proclaim, — since,  on  this  principle,  in  cases  innumerable,  tenderness  to  the 
dead  would  become  the  ground  of  cruel  injustice  to  the  living :  nay,  the 
maxim  would  continually  counterwork  itself ;  for  too  inexorable  a  forbear- 
ance with  regard  to  one  dead  person  would  oftentimes  effectually  close  the 
door  to  the  vindication  of  another.  In  fact,  neither  history  nor  biography 
is  able  to  move  a  step  without  infractions  of  this  rule  ;  a  rule  emanating 
from  the  blind  kindliness  of  grandmothers,  who,  whilst  groping  in  the  dark 
after  one  individual  darling,  forget  the  collateral  or  oblique  results  to  others 
without  end.  These  evils  being  perceived,  equitable  casuists  began  to  revise 
the  maxim,  and  in  its  new  form  it  stood  thus — ' De  mortuis  nil  nisi  verum' 
( '  Concerning  the  dead,  let  us  have  nothing  but  what  is  true ').  Why,  certainly, 
that  is  an  undeniable  right  of  the  dead  ;  and  nobody  in  his  senses  would 
plead  for  a  small  percentage  of  falsehood.  Yet,  again,  in  that  shape  the 
maxim  carries  with  it  a  disagreeable  air  of  limiting  the  right  to  truth.  Un- 
less it  is  meant  to  reserve  a  small  allowance  of  fiction  for  the  separate  use  of 
the  living,  why  insist  upon  truth  as  peculiarly  consecrated  to  the  dead  ?  If 
all  people,  living  and  dead  alike,  have  a  right  to  the  benefits  of  truth,  why 
specify  one  class,  as  if  in  silent  contradistinction  to  some  other  class,  less 
eminently  privileged  in  that  respect  ?  To  me  it  seems  evident  that  the 
human  mind  has  been  long  groping  darkly  after  some  separate  right  of  the 
dead  in  this  respect,  but  which  hitherto  it  has  not  been  able  to  bring  into 
reconciliation  with  the  known  rights  of  the  living.  Some  distinct  privilege 
there  should  be,  if  only  it  could  be  sharply  defined  and  limited,  through 
which  a  special  prerogative  might  be  recognised  as  among  the  sanctities  of 
the  grave." 

Strength. 

De  Quincey's  style,  as  the  reader  has  doubtless  remarked  in 
preceding  extracts,  is  not  animated — meaning  by  animation  the 
presentation  of  ideas  in  rapid  succession — it  stands,  in  fact,  to  use 
a  phrase  of  his  own,  in  "  polar  antithesis  "  to  the  animated  style. 
His  prevailing  characteristic  is  elaborate  stateliness.  He  finds  the 
happiest  exercise  of  his  powers  in  sustained  nights  through  the 

Ijregion  of  the  sublime. 

f~"  L  Let  us  first  exemplify  his  elevation  of  style  as  applied  to  the 
ordinary  subjects  of  lofty  composition,  such  as  men  of  extra- 
ordinary powers,  secret  machinations,  great  natural  phenomena, 
Bcenes  of  horror  and  confusion. 


STRENGTH.  65 

He  had  not,  like  Carlyle,  a  formal  gallery  of  historical  heroes.  )     <5T 


He  seldom  lends  his  powers  of  style  to  glorifying  the  great  men  of  "^^L,^ 
history.     His  tendency  was  rather  to  discover  and  develop  lurking 
objects  of  admiration  or  astonishment  —  the  daring  of  Zebek  Dorchi 
against  the  "  mighty  behemoth  of  Muscovy,"  the  energetic  hardi-        _^ 
hood  of  the  slave  that  attempted  to  assassinate  the  Emperor  Com-      Cs 
modus,  the  erection  of  a  statue  to  the  slave  ^Esop,  and  suchlike, 
The  following  is  his  account  of  "  Walking  Stewart,"  whom  almost 
anybody  else  would  have  passed  by  as  a  harebrained  enthusiast  :  — 

"  His  mind  was  a  mirror  of  the  sentient  universe  —  the  whole  mighty 
vision  that  had  fleeted  before  his  eyes  in  this  world  —  the  armies  of  Hyder 
All  and  his  son  Tippoo,  with  oriental  and  barbaric  pageantry  ;  the  civic 
grandeur  of  England  ;  the  great  deserts  of  Asia  and  America  ;  the  vast 
capitals  of  Europe  —  London,  with  its  eternal  agitations,  the  ceaseless  ebb 
and  flow  of  its  '  mighty  heart  '  ;  Paris,  shaken  by  the  fierce  torments  of  rev- 
olutionary convulsions  ;  the  silence  of  Lapland  ;  and  the  solitary  forests  of 
Canada  ;  with  the  swarming  life  of  the  torrid  zone  ;  together  with  innumer- 
able recollections  of  individual  joy  and  sorrow  that  he  had  participated  in  by 
sympathy,  —  lay  like  a  map  beneath  him,  as  if  eternally  co-present  to  his 
view  ;  so  that,  in  the  contemplation  of  the  prodigious  whole,  he  had  no  1 
leisure  to  separate  the  parts  or  occupy  his  mind  wiih  details." 

~)  ^ 
The  machinations  of  secret  societies  had  a  great  charm  for  him.  t  ^, 

Here  is  a  passage  concerning  the  Hetseria  of  Greece  :  —  *H  .   * 

"  It  cannot  be  denied  that  a  secret  society,  with  the  grand  and  almost 
awful  purposes  of  the  Hetseria,  spite  of  some  taint  which  it  had  received  in 
its  early  stages  from  the  spirit  of  German  mummery,  is  fitted  to  lill  the  im- 
agination, and  to  command  homage  from  the  coldest.  Whispers  circulating 
from  mouth  to  mouth  of  some  vast  conspiracy  mining  subterraneonsly 
beneath  the  very  feet  of  their  accursed  oppressors  —  whispers  of  a  great  de- 
liverer at  hand  whose  mysterious  Labarum,  or  mighty  banner  of  the  Cross, 
was  already  dimly  descried  throngh  northern  mists,  and  whose  eagles  were 
already  scenting  the  carnage  and  '  savour  of  death  '  from  innumerable  hosts 
of  Moslems  —  whispers  of  a  revolution  which  was  again  to  call,  as  with  the 
trumpet  of  resurrection,  from  the  grave,  the  land  of  Timoleon  and  Epamin- 
ondas  ;  such  were  the  preludings,  low  and  deep,  to  the  tempestuous  over- 
ture of  revolt  and  patriotic  battle  which  now  ran  through  every  nook  of  \ 
Greece,  and  caused  every  ear  to  tingle.  "  —  / 

The  following  is  an  example  of  his  description  of  sublime  natural  ' 
phenomena.     It  occurs  as  a  similitude  :  — 

"Has  the  reader  witnessed,  or  has  he  heard  described,  the  sudden  burst 
—  the  explosion,  one  might  say  —  by  which  a  Swedish  winter  passes  into 
•pring,  and  spring  simultaneously  into  summer  ?  The  icy  sceptre  of  winter 
does  not  there  thaw  and  melt  away  by  just  gradations  :  it  is  broken,  it  is 
shattered,  in  a  day,  in  an  hour,  and  with  a  violence  brought  home  to  every 
sense.  No  second  type  of  resurrection,  so  mighty  or  so  affecting,  is  mani- 
fested by  nature  in  southern  climates.  Such  is  the  headlong  tumult,  such 
the  '  torrent  rapture  '  by  which  life  is  let  loose  amongst  the  air,  the  earth, 
and  the  waters  under  the  earth.  Exactly  what  this  vernal  resurrection  is  in 

E 


66  THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 

manifestations  of  power  and  life,  by  comparison  with  climates  that  have  no 
winter;  such,  and  marked  with  features  as  distinct,  was,"  &c. 

As  an  example  of  his  power  of  -depicting  horrors,  take  his 
account  of  the  sack  of  Enniscorthy — 

"Next  came  a  scene  which  swallowed  up  all  distinct  or  separate  features 
in  its  frantic  confluence  of  horrors.  All  the  loyalists  of  Enniscorthy,  all  the 
gentry  for  miles  around  who  had  congregated  in  that  town  as  a  centre  of 
security,  were  summoned  at  that  moment,  not  to  an  orderly  retreat,  but  to 
instant  flight.  At  one  end  of  the  street  were  seen  the  rebel  pikes,  and  bay- 
onets, and  fierce  faces,  already  gleaming  through  the  smoke ;  at  the  other 
end  volumes  of  fire,  surging  and  billowing  from  the  thatched  roofs,  and 
bla/ing  rafters  beginning  to  block  up  the  avenues  of  escape.  Then  began 
the  agony  and  uttermost  conflict  of  what  is  worst  and  what  is  best  in 
human  nature.  Then  was  to  be  seen  the  very  delirium  of  fecr,  and  the 
very  delirium  of  vindictive  malice — private  and  ignoble  hatred,  of  ancient 
origin,  shrouding  itself  in  the  mask  of  patriotic  wrath  ;  the  tiger-glare 
of  just  vengeance,  fresh  from  intolerable  wrongs  and  the  never-to-be-for- 
gotten ignominy  of  stripes  and  personal  degradation  ;  panic,  self-palsied  by 
its  own  excess ;  flight,  eager  or  stealthy,  according  to  the  temper  ana  the 
means  ;  volleying  pursuit ;  the  very  frenzy  of  agitation,  under  every  mode 
of  excitement ;  and  hero  and  there  the  desperation  of  maternal  love  vic- 
torious and  supreme  above  all  lower  passions.  I  recapitulate  and  gather 
under  general  abstractions  many  an  individual  anecdote  reported  by  those 
who  were  on  that  day  present  in  Enniscorthy;  for  at  Ferns,  not  far  off,  and 
deeply  interested  in  all  those  transactions,  I  had  private  friends,  intimate 
participators  in  the  trials  of  that  fierce  hurricane,  and  joint  sufferers  with 
those  who  suffered  most." 

It  is  this  "  recapitulation  and  gathering  under  general  abstrac- 
tions "  that  raises  the  passage  above  those  hideous  accumulations 
of  horrible  particulars  faithfully  reported  by  newspaper  correspon- 
dents from  seats  of  war.  His  "Revolt  of  the  Tartars"  is  a  good 
example  of  sustained  grandeur  of  narrative  and  description  ;  there 
also  he  abstains  from  individual  horrors,  and  raises  the  imagination 
to  dwell  with  awe  upon  the  passions  raging  through  the  strife. 
^  II.  Let  us  now  constitute  a  special  section  for  his  peculiar  flights 
of  sublimity,  not  because  they  are  essentially  different  from  the 
preceding,  but  because  they  really  have,  what  they  claim  to  have, 
^l^t^leme^it^f_rje^uiiarity  ;  because^  in  short,  the^are  experi- 
mentaL  '. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  De  Quincey  claims  to  be  the  originator 
of  impassioned  prose.  He  makes  no  such  claim.  He  knew  as 
well  as  anybody  that  impassioned  prose  had  been  written  long 
before  his  day,  by  Jeremy  Taylor,  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  Milton, 
Burke,  and  others.1  What  he  did  claim  was  to  be  the  author  of 
a  "  mode  of_ impassioned  prose  ranging  under  no  precedents  that  he 
was'aware^f  in  any  literature."  Jie  speaks  of  the  utter  sterility 

1  Two,  «.t  least,  of  his  impassioned  apostrophes  are  modelled  upon  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh's  famous  apoctrophe  to  Death. 


SUBLIMITY.  67 

of  universal  literature,  not  in  impassioned  prose,  but  in  "  one  de- 
partment of  impassioned  prose."  That  department  may  be  de- 
scribed with  sufficient  precision  as  "impassioned  autobiography."  ' 

Why  cajl  this  a  special  department,  and  speak  of  it  as  a  haz- 
ardous experiment  ?  The  specialty  consists  in  describing  incidents 
of  purely  personal  interest  in  language  suited  to  their  magnitude 
as  they  appear  in  the  eyes  of  the  writer  ;  and  the  danger  is,  as  we 
have  had  occasion  to  notice  incidentally  (p.  59),  that  readers  be 
unsympathetic,  and  refuse  to  interest  themselves  in  the  writer's 
personal  feelings.  The  specialty  is  undoubtedly  considerable,  and 
so  is  the  danger.  That  De  Quincey  succeeded  was  shown  by  the 
popularity  of  his  autobiographical  works. 

The  mere  splendour  of  such  a  style  as  De  Quincey's  would,  to 
readers  prepared  to  enjoy  it,  overcome  a  great  amount  of  distaste- 
fulness  in  the  subject.  But  apart  from  the  mechanical  execution, 
he  showed  himself  sensible  of  the  chief  danger  in  the  treatment  of 
such  themes.  That  danger  is,  the  intrusion  of  personal  vanity. 
"  Any  expression  of  personal  vanity,  intruding  upon  impassioned 
records,  is  fatal  to  their  effect,  as  being  incompatible  with  that 
absorption  of  spirit  and  that  self-oblivion  in  which  only  deep 
passion  originates,  or  can  find  a  genial  home."  If  the  autobio- 
grapher  steps  aside  from  the  record  of  his  feelings  to  compare 
them  with  the  feelings  of  other  people,  and  to  make  out  that  he 
has  been  honoured,  afflicted,  or  agitated  above  other  people,  every 
reader's  self-conceit  takes  the  alarm,  and  forthwith  scans  the  writer 
with  cynical  antipathy.  De  Quincey  is  on  his  guard  against  mak- 
ing such  a  blunder!  He  does  not,  as  Mr  Tennyson  sometimes 
jloes,  exhibit^  his  sufferings  in  comparison  with,  th»  ffflffaripgs  o? 
"other  men,  and  claim  for  the  incidents  of  his  life  an  affinity  TritE 
the  most  tragical  events  incident  to  frail  humanity.  He  represses 
every  suggestion  that  he  regards  the  events  of  his  life  as  other 
than  commonplace  in  the  eye  of  an  impartial  observer.  He  is 
intent  upon  expounding  them  simply  as  they  affected  him ;  con- 
scious all  the  time  that  to  other  men  the  events  of  their  life  are 
of  equal  magnitude,  and  that  he  must  not  egotistically  challenge 
comparison  ;  knowing,  as  an  artist,  that  any  expression  of  personal 
vanity,  any  appearance  of  pluming  himself  upon  his  experience, 
is  fatal  to  the  effect  of  the  composition. 

We  need  not  fill  up  our  limited  space  with  quotations  from  a 
book  so  well  known  as  the  Opium  Confessions,  and  now  published 
at  sixpence.  One  only  will  be  given,  and  that  as  having  already 
been  alluded  to.  The  reader  will  notice  that  our  author  is 
wholly  engrossed  with  his  suffering  and  his  'sudden  resolution, 
and  endeavours  only  to  make  his  case  vividly  intelligible;  there 
is  no  trace  of  boastful  comparison  with  the  experience  of  other 
people :— 


68  THOMAS   DE   QUINCET. 

"  But  now,  at  last,  came  over  me,  from  the  mere  excess  of  bodily  suffering 
and  mental  disappointments,  a  frantic  and  rapturous  reagency  In  tho 
United  States  the  case  is  well  known,  and  many  times  has  been  described 
by  travellers,  of  that  furious  instinct  which,  under  a  secret  call  for  saline 
variations  of  diet,  drives  all  the  tribes  of  buffaloes  for  thousands  of  miles  to 
the  common  centre  of  the  'Salt-licks.'  Under  such  a  compulsion  does  the 
locust,  under  such  a  compulsion  does  the  leeming,  traverse  its  mysterious 
path.  They  are  deaf  to  danger,  deaf  to  the  cry  of  battle,  deaf  to  the  trum- 
pets of  death.  Let  the  sea  cross  their  path,  let  armies  with  artillery  bar  the 
road,  even  these  terrific  powers  can  arrest  only  by  destroying ;  and  tho 
most  frightful  abysses,  up  to  the  very  last  menace  of  engulfment,  up  to  the 
very  instant  of  absorption,  have  no  power  to  alter  or  retard  the  line  of  their 
inoxomble  advance. 

"Such  an  instinct  it  was,  such  a  rapturous  command — even  so  potent, 
and,  alas!  even  so  blind — that,  under  the  whirl  of  tumultuous  indignation 
and  of  new-born  hope,  suddenly  transfigured  my  whole  being.  In  the 
twinkling  of  an  eye,  I  came  to  an  adamantine  resolution — not  as  if  issuing 
from  any  act  or  any  choice  of  my  own,  but  as  if  positively  received  fnftn 
some  dark  oracular  legislation  external  to  myself. 

Pathos. 

From  the  prevailing  majesty  of  his  diction,  De  Quincey's  pathos 
is  rarely  of  a  homely  order.  In  some  of  his  papers,  as  in  the 
"  Military  Nun,"  there  are  touching  little  strokes  of  half-humorous 
tenderness.  But  his  most  characteristic  pathos  is  impassioned 
regret  for  departed  nobleness ;  in  which  case  he  blends  with  his 
expressions  of  sorrow  a  splendid  glorification  of  the  object,  so  that 
the  mind  is  at  once  saddened  and  filled  with  ideas  of  sublimity. 

The  impassioned  apostrophes  of  the  Opium  Confessions  are  toler- 
ably well  known.  We  may  therefore  choose  an  example  from  a 
composition  less  generally  known — his  paper  on  "  Joan  of  Arc  "  : — 

"What  is  to  be  thought  of  her  ?  What  is  to  be  thought  of  the  poor  shep- 
herd girl  from  the  hills  and  forests  of  Lorraine,  that — like  the  Hebrew 
shepherd  boy  from  the  hills  and  forests  of  Judea — rose  suddenly  out  of  the 
quiet,  out  of  the  safety,  out  of  the  religious  inspiration,  rooted  in  deep 
pastoral  solitudes,  to  a  station  in  the  van  of  armies,  and  to  the  more  peril- 
ous station  at  the  right  hand  of  kings?  .  .  .  Pure,  innocent,  noble- 
hearted  girl !  whom,  from  earliest  youth,  ever  I  believed  in  as  full  of  truth 
and  self-sacrifice,  this  was  amongst  the  strongest  pledges  for  thy  truth,  that 
never  once — no,  not  for  a  moment  of  weakness — didst  thou  revel  in  the  vision 
of  coronets  and  honour  from  man.  Coronets  for  thee  !  Oh  no  !  Honours,  if 
they  come  when  all  is  over,  are  for  those  that  share  thy  blood.  Daughter  of 
Domremy,  when  the  gratitude  of  thy  king  shall  awaken,  thou  wilt  be  sleep- 
ing the  sleep  of  the  dead.  Call  her,  king  of  France,  but  she  will  not  hear 
thee  !  Cite  her  by  thy  apparitors  to  come  and  receive  a  robe  of  honour,  but 
she  will  be  found  en  contumace.  When  the  thunders  of  universal  France, 
as  even  yet  may  happen,  shall  proclaim  the  grandeur  of  the  poor  shepherd 
girl  that  gave  up  all  for  her  country,  thy  ear,  young  shepherd  girl,  will  have 
been  deaf  for  five  centuries.  To  suffer  and  to  die,  that  was  thy  portion  in 
this  life  ;  that  was  thy  destiny  ;  and  not  for  a  moment  was  it  hidden  from 
thyself.  Life,  thou  saidst,  is  short ;  and  the  sloop  which  is  in  the  grave  is 


PATHOS — HUMdUR.  69 

long.  Let  me  use  that  life,  so  transitory,  for  the  glory  of  those  heavenly 
dreams  destined  to  comfort  the  sleep  which  is  so  long.  This  pure  creature 
— pure  from  every  suspicion  of  even  a  visionary  self-interest,  even  as  she 
was  pure  in  senses  more  obvious — never  once  did  this  holy- child,  as  re- 
garded herself,  relax  from  her  belief  in  the  darkness  that  was  travelling  to ' 
meet  her.  She  might  not  prefigure  the  very  manner  of  her  death  ;  she  saw 
not  in  vision,  perhaps,  the  aerial  altitude  of  the  fiery  scaffold,  the  spectators' 
without  end  on  every  road  pouring  into  Rouen  as  to  a  coronation,  the  surg- 
ing smoke,  the  volleying  flames,  the  hostile  faces  all  around,  the  pitying  eye 
that  lurked  but  here  and  there,  until  nature  and  imperishable  truth  broke 
loose  from  artificial  restraints, — these  might  not  be  apparent  through  the 
mists  of  the  hurrying  future.  But  the  voice  that  called  her  to  death,  that 
she  heard  for  ever." 

As  an  example  of  a  pathetic  apostrophe,  in  a  less  touching  but 
still  impressive  key,  take  his  reminiscence  of  Edward  Irving,  from 
one  of  his  unreprinted  papers  : — 

"  He  was  the  only  man  of  our  times  who  realised  one's  idea  of  Paul  preach- 
ing at  Athens,  or  defending  himself  before  King  Agrippa.  Terrific  meteor ! 
unhappy  son  of  fervid  genius,  which  mastered  thyself  even  more  than  the 
rapt  audiences  which  at  one  time  hung  upon  thy  lips  !  were  the  cup  of  life 
once  again  presented  to  thy  lips,  wouldst  thou  drink  again  ?  or  wouldst  thou 
not  rather  turn  away  from  it  with  shuddering  abomination  ?  Sleep,  Boan- 
erges, and  let  the  memory  of  man  settle  only  upon  thy  colossal  powers, 
without  a  thought  of  those  intellectual  aberrations  which  were  more  power- 
ful for  thy  own  ruin  than  for  the  misleading  of  others  1 " 

Humour. 

Our  authors  "  Murder  considered  as  one  of  the  Fine  Arts,"  be- 
longs to  a  vein  of  irony  peculiarly  his  own — the  humour  of  bring- 
ing the  ideas  of  Fine  Art  and  ordinary  business  into  ludicrous 
collision  with  solemn  or  horrible  transactions.  An  extract  or  two 
from  the  beginning  of  this  paper  will  give  an  idea  of  its  character. 
It  is  preceded  by  an  "  Advertisement  of  a  man  morbidly  virtuous," 
which  begins  thus — 

"  Most  of  us  who  read  books,  have  probably  heard  of  a  society  for  the 
promotion  of  vice,  of  the  Hell-Fire  Club,  founded  in  the  last  century  by  Sir 
Francis  Dashwood,  &c.  At  Brighton,  I  think  it  was,  that  a  society  was 
formed  for  the  suppression  of  virtue.  That  society  was  itself  suppressed ; 
but  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  another  exists  in  London,  of  a  character  still  more 
atrocious.  In  tendency,  it  may  be  denominated  a  society  for  the  encourage- 
ment of  murder ;  but,  according  to  their  own  delicate  eixpj] /t«r fibs,  it  is  styled, 
The  Society  of  Connoisseurs  in  Murder.  The}'  profess  to  be  curious  in  homi- 
cide ;  amateurs  and  dilettanti  in  the  various  modes  of  carnage ;  and,  in  short, 
murder-fanciers.  Every  fresh  atrocity  of  that  class  which  the  police  annals 
of  Europe  bring  up,  they  meet  and  criticise  as  they  would  a  picture,  statue, 
or  other  work  of /art.  But  I  need  not  trouble  myself  with  any  attempt  to 
describe  the  spirit  of  their  proceedings,  as  the  reader  will  collect  that  much 
better  from  one  of  the  monthly  lectures  read  before  the  society  last  year. 
This  has  fallen  into  my  hands  accidentally,  in  spite  of  all  the  vigilanca 
exercised  <»  keep  their  transactions  from  the  public  eye." 


70  THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 

The  "  morbidly  virtuous  "  advertiser  concludes  by  saying  that 
he  has  not  yet  heard  of  the  society  offering  prizes  for  a  well- 
executed  murder,  but  that  "  undoubtedly  their  proceedingsHend 
to  that."  The  atrocious  lecture  thus  exposed  to  the  eye  of  the 
public  begins  as  follows  : — 

"  GENTLEMEN, — I  have  had  the  honour  to  he  appointed  by  your  committee 
to  the  trying  task  of  reading  the  Williams'  Lecture  on  Murder  considered  as 
one  of  the  l('ine  Arts, — a  task  which  might  be  easy  enough  three  or  four 
centuries  ago,  when  the  art  was  little  understood,  and  few  great  models  hail 
been  exhibited ;  but  in  this  age,  when  masterpieces  of  excellence  have  been 
.executed  by  professional  men,  it  must  be  evident,  that  in  the  style  of  criti- 
cism applied  to  them,  the  public  will  look  for  something  of  a  corresponding 
improvement.  Practice  and  theory  must  advance pari  passu.  People  begin 
to  see  that  something  more  goes  to  the  composition  of  a  fine  murder  than 
two  blockheads  to  kill  and  be  killed — a  knife — a  purse — and  ft  dark  lane. 
Design,  gejitlemen,  grouping,  light  and  shade,  poetry,  sentiment,  are  now 
deemed  indispensable  to  attempts  of  this  nature.  Mr  Williams  has  exalted 
the  ideal  of  murder  to  all  of  us ;  and  to  me,  therefore,  in  particular,  has 
deepened  the  arduousness  of  my  task.  Like  ^Eschylus  or  Milton  in  poetry, 
like  Michael  Angelo  in  painting,  he  has  carried  his  art  to  a  point  of  colossal 
sublimity  ;  and,  as  Mr  Wordsworth  observes,  has  in  a  manner  '  created  the 
taste  by  which  he  is  to  be  enjoyed.'  To  sketch  the  history  of  the  art  and  to 
examine  his  principles  critically,  now  remains  as  a  duty  for  the  connoisseur, 
and  for  judges  of  quite  another  stamp  from  his  Majesty's  Judges  of  Assize." 

The  humour  is  kept  up  through  fifty-seven  pages.1 

The  "  Williams'  Lecture  "  is  the  crowning  achievement  of  his 
humour.  His  works  contain  many  occasional  touches,  in  the  same 
vein.  He  is  frequently  jocular  on  the  subject  of  death.  Thus — 

"  In  like  manner,  I  do  by  no  means  deny  that  some  truths  have  been 
delivered  to  the  world  in  regard  to  opium  :  thus,  it  has  been  repeatedly 
affirmed  by  the  learned  that  opium  is  a  tawny  brown  in  colour — and  this, 
take  notice,  I  grant ;  secondly,  that  it  is  rather  dear,  which  also  I  grant — for 
in  my  time  East  India  opium  has  been  three  guineas  a-pound,  and  Turkey 
eight :  and,  thirdly,  that  if  you  eat  a  good  deal  of  it,  most  probably  you 
must  do  what  is  disagreeable  to  any  man  of  regular  habits — viz.,  die." 

Again,  alluding  to  Savage  Landor's  contumacy  at  school : — 

"  ' Roberte  the  Deville  :'  see  the  old  metrical  romance  of  that  name  :  it 
belongs  to  the  fourteenth  century,  and  was  printed  some  thirty  years  ago, 
with  wood  engravings  of  the  illuminations.  Roberte,  however,  took  the 
liberty  of  murdering  his  schoolmaster.  But  could  he  well  do  less  ?  Being 
a  reigning  Duke's  son,  and  after  the  rebellious  schoolmaster  had  said — 

'  Sir,  ye  bee  too  bolde  : 
And  therewith  took  a  rodde  hym  for  to  chaste.' 

Upon  which  the  meek  Robin,  without  using  any  bad  language  as  the  school- 
master had  done,  simply  took  out  a  long  dagger  '  hym  for  to  chaste,'  whicli 
he  did  effectually.  The  schoolmaster  gave  no  bad  language  after  that. " 

1  The  paper  occurs  in  vol.  iv.  of  the  Collected  Edition.  This  volume,  contain, 
ing  also  the  "  Revolt  of  the  Tartars,  "the  "Templar's  Dialogues,"  and  the  "Vision 
of  Sudden  Death,"  affords  good  examples  of  all  the  qualities  of  his  style. 


HUMOUR — MELODY   AND   HARMONY.  71 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  De  Quincey's  humour  consists 
aolely  in  this  playing  with  dread  ideas.  His  works,  as  we  noticed 
in  sketching  his  character,  overflow  with  good-natured  humour  of 
every  description.  It  is  often  of  that  strongly  individual  kind- 
which  only  intimate  sympathisers  can  tolerate ;  strangers  call  it 
impertinent,  flippant,  affected.  Take,  for  example,  one  of  his 
playful  apostrophes  to  historical  names : — 

"  Sam  Parr  !  I  love  you.  .  I  said  so  once  before.  But  per 'stringing,  which 
was  a  favoured  word  of  your  own,  was  a  no  less  favoured  act.  You  also  in 
your  lifetime  perstringed  many  people,  some  of  whom  perstringed  you,  Sam, 
smartly  in  return." 

"I  (said  Augustus  Csesar)  found  Rome  built  of  brick  ;  but  I  left  it  built 
of  marble.  Well,  my  man,  we  reply,  for  a  wondrously  little  chap,  you  did 
what  in  Westmoreland  they  call  a  good  darroch  (day's  work)  ;  and  if  navvies 
had  beejt  wanted  in  those  days,  you  should  have  had  outvote  to  a  certainty. 
But  Caius  Julius,  even  under  such  a  limitation  of  the  comparison,  did  a 
thing  as  much  transcending  this,"  &c. 

We  must  also  give  a  specimen  of  his  humorous  "  slangy  "  out- 
rages on  the  dignity  of  criticism.  The  following  occurs  in  his 
"  Brief  Appraisal  of  Greek  Literature,"  which  has  not  been  re- 
printed : — 

' '  But  all  this  extent  of  obligation  amongst  later  poets  of  Greece  to  Homer 
serves  less  to  argue  his  opulence  than  their  penury.  And  if,  quitting  the 
one  great  blazing  jewel,  the  Urim  and  Thurnmim  of  the  Iliad"  [Achilles], 
"you  descend  to  individual  passages  of  poetic  effect ;  and  if  amongst  these 
a  fancy  should  seize  you  of  asking  for  a  specimen  of  the  sublime  in  particular, 
what  is  it  that  you  are  offered  by  the  critics  ?  Nothing  that  we  remember 
beyond  one  single  passage,  in  which  the  God  Neptune  is  described  in  a 
steeplechase,  and  '  making  play  '  at  a  terrific  pace.  And  certainly  enough 
is  exhibited  of  the  old  boy's  hoofs,  and  their  spanking  qualities,  to  warrant 
our  backing  him  against  .a  railroad  for  a  rump  and  dozen  ;  but,  after  all, 
there  is  nothing  to  grow  frisky  about,  as  Longinus  does,  who  gets  up  the 
steam  of  a  bluu-stocking  enthusiasm,  and  boils  us  a  regular  gallop  of  ranting, 
in  which,  like  the  conceited  snipe  upon  the  Liverpool  railroad,  he  thinks 
himself  to  run  a  match  with  Sampson  ;  and  whilst  affecting  to  admire  Homer, 
is  manifestly  squinting  at  the  reader  to  see  how  far  he  admires  his  own 
nourish  of  admiration  ;  and,  in  the  very  agony  of  his  frosty  raptures,  is 
quite  (at  leisure  to  look  out  for  a  little  private  traffic  of  rapture  on  his  own 
account.  But  it  won't  do  ;  this  old  critical  posture-master  (whom,  if  Aurelius 
hanged,  surely  he  knew  what  he  was  about)  may  as  well  put  up  his  rapture 
pipes,  and  (as  Lear  says)  '  not  squiny '  at  us  ;  for  let  us  ask  Master  Longinus, 
in  what  earthly  respect  do  these  great  strides  of  Neptune  exjceed  Jack  with 
his  seven-league  boots  ?  Let  him  answer  that,  if  he  can.  We  hold  that 
Jack  has  the  advantage." 

Melody  and  Harmony, 

The  melody  of  De  Quincey's  prose  is  pre-eminently  rich  and 
stately.  He  takes  rank  with  Milton  as  one  of  our  greatest  mas- 
ters of  stately  cadence,  as  well  as  of  sublime  composition.  If  one 
may  trust  one's  ear  for  a  general  impression,  Milton's  melody  ia 


72  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

sweeter  and  more  varied ;  but  for  magnificent  effects,  at  least  in 
prose,  the  palm  must  probably  be  assigned  to  De  Quincey.  In 
some  of  De  Quincey's  grandest  passages  the  language  can  be  com- 
pared only  to  the  swell  and  crash  of  an  orchestra. 

It  need  hardly  be  added  that  the  harmony  between  his  rhythm 
and  his  subject-matter  is  most  striking  in  the  sublime  flights. 

Taste. 

De  Quincey  has  been  accused  of  crossing  the  bounds  of  good 
taste  in  certain  respects.  I  His  digressions  and  footnotes  have  been 
objected  to.  i-  His  punctilious  precision  in  the  use  of  terms  has  been 
called  pedantic.  -*He  has  been  censured  for  carrying  to  excess  what 
we  have  described  as  his  favourite  figure./  But  especially  he  has 
been  visited  with  severe  condemnation  for  his  offences  in  the  pur- 
suit of  comic  effect — more  particularly  in  the  use  of  slang.  A 
recent  critic  has  gone  the  length  of  describing  his  "  slangy"  apos- 
trophes as  "  exquisite  foolery." 


KINDS   OP   COMPOSITION. 

Description. 

Though  so  many  of  De  Quincey's  papers  are  descriptive,  and  are 
properly  designated  sketches,  he  has  really  left  us  very  little  de- 
,  tailed  description  of  external  nature.  The  reason  is  to  be  found 
in  his  character.  His  interest  was  almost  wholly  engrossed  by 
man.  The  description  that  he  excelled  in  was  description  of  the 
human  form,  feelings,  and  manners. 

Where  he  does  attempt  the  description  of  still  life,  notwithstand- 
ing his  natural  clearness  and  order,  he  is  much  inferior  to  Carlyle. 
He  has  one  or  two  good  points.  He  gives  right  and  left  in  his 
pictures,  and  brings  in  such  touches  of  precision  as — "  standing  on 
a  different  radius  of  my  circular  prospect,  but  at  nearly  the  same 
distance:" — which  is  very  significant,  if  not  too  scholastic.  But 
if  we  take  even  such  a  studied  piece  as  his  description  of  the  valley 
of  Easedale,  at  the  beginning  of  his  "  Kecollections  of  the  Lakes," 
vol.  ii.,  we  miss  the  vividness  of  a  master  of  the  descriptive  art 
We  receive  no  idea  of  such  a  fundamental  fact  as  the  size  of  the 
valley :  we  are,  indeed,  presented  rather  with  the  feelings  and 
;  reflections  of  a  poetically-minded  spectator,  than  with  the  material 
aspects  of  the  scene. 

Generally  speaking,  he  describes  nature  only  in  its  direct  or 

".figurative  relations  to  man.     A  scene  is  interesting  as  "the  very 

same  spectacle,  unaltered  in  a  single  feature,  which  once  at  the 

same  hour  was  beheld  by  the  legionary  Roman  from  his  embattled 

:  ;camp,  or  by  the  roving  Briton  in  his  '  wolf-skin  vest'  "     A  hamlet 


DESCRIPTION.  73 

of  seven  cottages  clustering  together  round  a  lonely  highland  tarn, 
is  interesting  as  suggesting  seclusion  from  the  endless  tumults  and 
angry  passions  of  human  society ;  the  declining  light  of  the  after- 
noon, from  its  association  with  the  perils  and  dangers  of  the 
night.  Thus  it  happens  that  often,  instead  of  describing  he 
really  expounds  —  expounds  the  thoughts  that  arise  from  the 
general  features  of  a  scene  by  force  of  association  or  of  simili- 
tude. We  see  this  in  hia  description  of  the  English  Lake 
scenery : — 

"  But  more  even  than  Anne  Radcliffe  had  the  landscape-painters,  so  many 
and  so  various,  contributed  to  the  glorification  of  the  English  Lake  district ; 
drawing  out  and  impressing  upon  the  heart  the  sanctity  of  repose  in  its  shy 
recesses  —  its  Alpine  grandeur  in  such  passes  as  those  of  Wastdalehead, 
Langdalehead,  Borrowdale,  Kirkstone,  Hawsdale,  &c.,  together  with  the 
monastic  peace  which  seems  to  brood  over  its  peculiar  form  of  pastoral  life, 
so  much  nobler  (as  Wordsworth  notices)  in  its  stern  simplicity  and  con- 
tinual conflict  with  danger  hidden  in  the  vast  draperies  of  mist  overshadow- 
ing the  hills,  and  amongst  the  armies  of  snow  and  hail  arrayed  by  fierce 
northern  winters,  than  the  effeminate  shepherd's  life  in  the  classical  Arcadia,  / 
or  in  the  flowery  pastures  of  Sicily. " 

An  indifferent  observer  of  nature,  De  Quincey  was  minute  and 
precise  in  his  observation  of  human  beings.  Every  face  that  he 
niet  he  seems  to  have  watched  with  the  vigilant  attention  of  a 
Boswell.  He  has  described  the  persons  of  many  of  his  contem- 
poraries. His  most  careful  portraits  are,  perhaps,  his  Lake  com- 
panions— Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Southey,  and  Wilson.  To  these 
must  be  added  his  delineation  of  the  notorious  murderer  Williams. 
The  reader  that  desires  to  see  how  watchful  an  eye  he  had  for  the 
smallest  particularities  of  shape,  look,  and  bearing,  will  do  well  to_ 
read  his  prefatory  note  on  Coleridge,  vol.  xi 

It  is  in  the  description  of  the  feelings  that  he  particularly  excelsTl 
Not  only  is  he  deeply  learned  in  the  proper  vocabulary  of  the 
feelings ;  he  had  acquired  by  close  study,  and  employs  with 
exquisite  skill,  a  profound  knowledge  of  the  outward  manifesta- 
tions of  feeling  in  tone,  feature,  gesture,  and  conduct.  In  reading 
motives  from  what  he  •would  have  called  the  dumb  hieroglyphics 
of  observed  or  recorded  behaviour,  and  in  tracing  the  succession 
of  feelings  that  must  have  passed  under  given  circumstances,  he 
is  one  of  our  greatest  masters.  In  this  point  more  perhaps  than  in 
any  other,  he  challenges  the  closest  attention  of  the  student. 

A  good  specimen  of  his  power  is  the  passage  in  the  Marr 
murder  where  he  pictures  Mary's  feelings  on  her  returning  to 
the  door  and  finding  it  locked: — 

"  Mary  rang,  and  at  the  same  time  very  gently  knocked.  She  had  no 
fear  of  disturbing  her  master  or  mistress ;  them  she  made  sure  of  finding 
still  up.  Her  anxiety  was  for  the  baby,  who,  being  disturbed,  might  again 


74  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

rob  her  mistress  of  a  night's  rest ;  and  she  well  knew  that  with  three  people 
all  anxiously  awaiting  her  return,  and  by  this  time,  perhaps,  seriously  un- 
easy at  her  delay,  the  least  audible  whisper  from  herself  would  in  a  moment 
bring  one  of  them  to  the  door.  Yet  how  is  this  ?  To  her  astonishment- - 
but  with  the  astonishment  came  creeping  over  her  an  icy  horror — no  stir  nor 
murmur  was  heard  ascending  from  the  kitchen.  At  this  moment  came  back 
upon  her,  with  shuddering  anguish,  the  indistinct  image,  of  the  stranger  in 
the  loose  dark  coat  whom  she  had  seen  stealing  along  under  the  shadowy 
lamplight,  and  too  certainly  watching  her  master's  motions.  Keenly  she 
now  reproached  herself  that  under  whatever  stress  of  hurry  she  had  not 
acquainted  Mr  Marr  with  the  suspicious  appearances.  Poor  girl !  she  did 
not  then  know  that,  if  this  communication  could  have  availed  to  put  Marr 
upon  his  guard,  it  had  reached  him  from  another  quarter  ;  so  that  her  own 
omission,  which  had  in  reality  arisen  under  her  hurry  to  execute  her  master's 
commission,  could  not  be  charged  with  any  bad  consequences.  But  all  such 
reflections  this  way  or  that  were  swallowed  up  at  this  point  in  overmastering 
panic.  That  her  double  summons  could  have  been  unnoticed — this  solitary 
fart  in  one  moment  made  a  revelation  of  horror.  One  person  might  have 
fallen  asleep,  but  two — but  three — that  was  a  mere  impossibility.  And  even 
supposing  all  three  together  with  the  baby  locked  in  sleep,  still  how  un- 
accountable was  this  utter,  utter  silence  !  Most  naturally  at  this  moment 
something  like  hysterical  horror  overshadowed  the  poor  girl ;  and  now,  at 
last,  she  rang  the  bell  with  the  violence  that  belongs  to  sickening  terror. 
This  done,  she  paused.  Self-command  enough  she  still  retained,  though 
fast  and  fast  it  was  slipping  away  from  her,  to  bethink  herself  that,  if  any 
overwhelming  accident  had  compelled  both  Marr  and  his  npprentice-boy  to 
leave  the  house  in  order  to  summon  surgical  aid  from  opposite  quarters — a 
thing  barely  supposable — still,  even  in  that  case,  Mrs  Marr  and  her  infant 
would  be  left,  and  some  murmuring  reply,  under  any  extremity,  would  be 
elicited  from  the  poor  mother.  To  pause,  therefore,  to  impose  stern  silence 
upon  herself,  so  as  to  leave  room  for  the  possible  answer  to  this  final  appeal, 
became  a  duty  of  spasmodic  effort.  Listen,  therefore,  poor  trembling  heart ; 
listen,  and  for  twenty  seconds  be  as  still  as  death.  Still  as  death  she  was  ; 
and  during  that  dreadful  stillness,  when  she  hushed  her  breath  that  she 
might  listen,  occurred  an  incident  of  killing  fear,  that  to  her  dying  day 
would  never  cease  to  renew  its  echoes  in  her  ear." 

Narrative, 

De  Quincey  never  attempted  any  continuous  history.  Taking 
his  own  division  of  history  into  Narrative,  Scenical,  and  Philo- 
sophical, we  see  that  he  had  special  qualifications  for  the  two 
last  modes.  But  he  wanted  industry  to  take  up  a  national  history 
and  pursue  it  continuously  through  all  its  stages.  What  he  might 
have  done  we  can  guess  only  from  speculations  recorded  incident- 
ally in  such  papers  as  his  account  of  the  Csesars,  or  of  Cicero,  or 
Charlemagne,  and  from  the  spectacular  sketch  of  the  Revolt  of 
the  Tartars. 

He  wrote  several  short  biographies.  In  these  he  has  at  least 
the  negative  merit  of  not  chronicling  unimportant  facts.  They 
can  hardly  be  called  narratives ;  there  is  in  them  as  little  as 
possible  of  anything  that  could  be  called  narrative  art.  They 
are,  properly  speaking,  discussions  of  perplexities  that  have 


EXPOSITION.  75 

gathered  about  the  story  of  the  individual  life,  and  descriptions 
of  the  various  features  of  the  character. 

In  his  most  imaginative  tales,  such  as  the  "Spanish  Military 
Nun,"  the  facts  are  altogether  secondary  to  the  poetical  embel- 
lishments— are  but  the  bare  cloth  on  which  he  works  his  many- 
coloured  tapestry  of  pathos,  humour,  and  soaring  rhapsodies. 

Exposition. 

De  Quincey  possessed  some  of  the  best  qualities  of  an  expositor, 
coupled  with  considerable  defects. 

The  great  obstacle  to  his  success  in  exposition  was  the  want  of 
simplicity.  He  was,  as  we  have  seen,  too  persistently  scholastic 
for  the  ordinary  reader,  making  an  almost  ostentatious  use  of 
logical  forms  and  scientific  technicalities. 

As  his  studious  clearness  is  marred  by  an  unnecessary  use  of 
unfamiliar  words  and  forms  of  expression,  so  others  of  his  merits 
in  exposition  must  be  stated  with  some  abatement. 

He  was  aware  of  the  value  of  iterating  a  statement.  "  A  man,'' 
he  says,  "  who  should  content  himself  with  a  single  condensed 
enunciation  of  a  perplexed  doctrine,  would  be  a  madman  and  a 
felo  de  se,  as  respected  his  reliance  upon  that  doctrine."  Yet  he 
considered  iteration  a  departure  "  from  the  severities  of  abstract 
discussion."  "  In  the  senate,  and  for  the  same  reason  in  a  news- 
paper, it  is  a  virtue  to  reiterate  your  meaning :  tautology  becomes 
a  merit ;  variation  of  the  words,  with  a  substantial  identity  of  the 
sense  and  dilution  of  the  truth,  is  oftentimes  a  necessity."  But 
in  a  book,  he  held,  repetition  is  rather  a  blemish,  seeing  that 
the  reader  may  "  return  to  the  past  page  if  anything  in  the 
present  depends  upon  it."  In  this  he  was  probably  unpractical : 
doubtless  the  reader  is  saved  much  weariness  by  judicious  re- 
petition, although  of  course  less  is  needed  in  a  book  than  in  a 
speech. 

He  knew  also  the  value  of  stating  the  counter-proposition.  In 
upholding  the  Bicardian  law  that  the  value  of  a  thing  is  deter- 
mined by  the  quantity  of  the  labour  that  produces  it,  he  broadly 
declares  that  the  mere  statement  of  the  doctrine  brings  the  student 
not  one  step  nearer  the  truth,  unless  he  is  told  what  it  is  designed 
to  contradict — namely,  that  the  value  of  the  thing  is  not  deter- 
mined by  the  value  of  the  producing  labour. 

When  he  is  thoroughly  in  earnest,  and  resolved  to  make  an 
abstruse  point  clear  to  the  meanest  capacity,  he  knows  how  to 
proceed  by  means  of  simple  examples  and  illustrations.  The  mis- 
fortune is,  that  he  is  not  always  alive  to  the  abstruseness  of  the 
question  he  happens  to  be  dealing  with,  and  consequently  wears 
to  many  readers  an  air  of  repulsive  incomprehensibility. 


76  '  THOMAS   DE   QUINCEY. 

His  power  of  clothing  a  dry  subject  with  interest  appears  ad- 
vantageously in  his  "  Templar's  Dialogues  on  Political  Economy." 
In  respect  of  varied  interest,  this  fragment  is  equal  to  the  dia- 
logues of  Plato. 

In  consequence  chiefly  of  his  abstruseness,  he  cannot  be  recom- 
mended as  a  model  to  the  popular  expositor.  Yet  his  command 
of  language,  his  precision,  and  his  power  of  imparting  interest, 
make  him  a  profitable  study  if  the  student  knows  what  to  imitate 
and  what  to  avoid. 


CHAPTER    IL 


THOMAS    BABINGTON    MACAULAY, 

I800— 1859. 

THIS  most  popular  of  modern  prose  writers  was  born  on  the  25th 
of  October  1800,  at  Kothley  Temple  in  Leicestershire,  the  residence 
of  his  uncle-in-law  and  name-father,  Thomas  Babington. 

His  father,  Zachary  Macaulay,  was  a  man  of  some  note,  and  was 
judged  worthy  of  a  monument  in  Westminster  Abbey.  The  son 
of  a  Scotch  minister  in  Dumbartonshire,  he  made  a  moderate  for- 
tune in  Jamaica  and  Sierra  Leone,  and  on  his  return  to  England 
in  1799,  became  a  principal  supporter  of  the  Society  for  the  Aboli- 
tion of  Slavery.  A  dry  taciturn  man,  writing  a  plain  terse  style, 
he  bore  little  outward  resemblance  to  his  distinguished  son ;  but 
he  had  the  same  untiring  powers  of  work,  and  the  same  extraordi- 
nary strength  of  memory.  He  edited  the  newspaper  of  the  Aboli- 
tionists, and  was  the  great  master  of  the  statistics  employed  for 
the  agitation  of  the  public  mind.  The  historian's  mother,  a  pupil 
of  the  sisters  of  Hannah  More,  was  also  a  person  of  talent ;  to  her 
he  seem*  to  have  owed  his  buoyant  constitution. 

Never,  to  use  his  own  favourite  mode  of  expression,  was  a  child 
brought  into  this  world  under  circumstances  more  favourable  to 
the  development  of  literary  talent.  His  parents  belonged  to  a 
small  sect  of  earnest  and  accomplished  persons,  closely  knit  to- 
gether by  a  common  object,  and  zealously  devoted  to  their  adopted 
mission.  With  the  earliest  dawn  of  intelligence  he  heard  imperial 
policy  discussed  at  his  father's  table,  and  the  affairs  of  the  nation 
arranged,  not  by  ideal  politicians,  but  by  men  actively  engaged  in 
public  business — such  men  as  Henry  Thornton,  Thomas  Babington, 
and  Wilberforce.  He  saw  his  father  preparing  their  printed  organ, 
and  at  an  early  age  was  taught  by  that  encyclopedic  statistician 


78  THOMAS  BABINGTON  MACAULAY. 

the  argumentative  value  of  facts.  There  being  the  closest  inter- 
course between  the  families  of  the  Clapham  sect,  a  boy  of  promis- 
ing abilities  met  with  much  attention,  and  many  willing  instruc- 
tors of  his  youthful  curiosity.  Besides,  young  "Tom,"  bright  and 
loquacious,  was  an  especial  favourite  with  Hannah  More,  "  the 
high  priestess  of  the  brotherhood,"  and  had  his  fancy  quickened 
and  his  ambition  fired  by  her  anecdotes  of  the  literary  men  of  last 
century. 

He  was  not  sent  to  any  of  the  great  public  schools.  He  received 
his  earliest  instruction  at  a  small  school  in  Clapham.  "  At  the 
age  of  twelve  he  was  placed  under  the  care  of  the  Rev.  Mr  Preston, 
first  at  Shelford,  afterwards  near  Buntingford,  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Cambridge."  With  Mr  Preston  he  seems  to  have  remained 
until  ready  to  enter  the  University. 

In  his  nineteenth  year  he  began  residence  at  Trinity  College, 
Cambridge.  In  after-life  he  used  to  mention  with  regret  that  at 
College  he  spent  very  little  time  on  the  prevailing  study  of  mathe- 
matics; but  classics  he  prosecuted  with  such  success,  that  in  1821 
he  gained  the  high  distinction  of  the  Craven  scholarship.  A  large 
part  of  his  time  was  given  to  pursuits  not  so  strictly  academical ; 
he  was  a  distinguished  orator  at  the  Union,  and  twice  carried 
away  the  Chancellor's  medal  for  English  verse  —  in  1819  for  a 
poem  on  Pompeii,  and  in  1821  for  a  poem  on  Evening.  He  took 
his  degree  of  B.A.  in  1822,  and  in  October  1824  was  elected  Fellow 
of  his  College. 

Very  soon  after  taking  his  degree,  and  while  waiting  in  College 
for  his  fellowship,  he  set  himself  strenuously  to  fulfil  his  ambition 
in  literature.  His  first  efforts  were  contributed  to  '  Knight's  Quar- 
terly Magazine,'  between  June  1823  and  November  1824.  From 
these  early  productions  we  can  see  that  he  did  not  work  at  random, 
but  to  some  extent  pursued  definite  objects.  Thus,  in  his  "  Frag- 
ments of  a  Roman  Tale,"  and  his  "  Scenes  from  Athenian  Revels," 
we  can  discern  a  purpose — a  purpose  that  he  often  recommends  as 
the  highest  aim  of  the  historian, — namely,  to  realise  the  private 
life  of  the  bygone  generations.  Again,  from  his  studies  of  Dante, 
Petrarch,  Cowley,  Milton,  and  the  Athenian  orators,  we  may  infer 
that  he  worked  upon  the  orthodox  plan  for  literary  aspirants,  of 
making  himself  familiar  with  the  leading  masters  of  style  in  dif- 
ferent languages.  Then  we  have  an  indication  of  a  mechanical 
plan  of  working.  His  contributions  appear  in  pairs — a  grave  com- 
position coupled  with  something  lighter.  If  this  was  not  the 
arrangement  of  the  publisher,  we  may  suppose  that  he  sought  the 
relief  of  variety,  and  that  from  tbe  first  he  worked  upon  a  deliberate 
resolve  to  excel  in  all  kinds  of  composition. 

In  1824  he  made  his  first  appearance  as  a  public  speaker.  At 
an  Abolitionist  meeting  in  Freemasons'  Hall,  he  seconded  one  of 


LIFE.  79 

the  resolutions,  and  his  speech  is  said  to  have  created  some  talk 
among  outsiders. 

The  performance  that  first  brought  him  conspicuously  into  notice 
was  his  article  on  Milton,  contributed  to  the  '  Edinburgh  Review ' 
in  August  1825.  He  was  called  to  the  bar  in  1826 ;  but  though 
he  took  chambers  in  the  Temple  and  joined  the  Northern  Circuit, 
he  probably  gave  little  time  to  legal  business,  and  he  made  no 
name  as  a  barrister.  It  was  his  literary  power  that  found  him 
patronage.  In  1827  he  received  from  Lord  Lyndhurst  a  commis- 
eionership  of  bankrupts.  And  in  1830,  through  the  influence  of 
Lord  Lansdowne,  he  was  returned  for  the  borough  of  Calne,  and 
entered  the  House  of  Commons. 

In  the  Reform  debates  of  1831  and  1832  he  was  one  of  the  most 
effective  speakers.  He  went  strongly  and  unreservedly  with  the 
Whigs.  In  1832,  as  an  acknowledgment  of  his  zeal  for  Reform, 
he  was  returned  by  the  newly  enfranchised  borough  of  Leeds. 
In  the  same  year  he  was  appointed  Secretary  to  the  Board  of 
Control  In  the  first  session  of  the  Reformed  Parliament  he 
spoke  against  the  repeal  of  the  union  with  Ireland,  in  favour  of 
a  bill  for  removing  the  civil  disabilities  of  the  Jews,  and  in  favour 
of  a  bill  for  depriving  the  East  India  Company  of  their  exclusive 
trade  with  China  and  other  commercial  privileges.  In  1834  he 
was  made  president  of  a  new  law  commission  for  India,  and  a 
member  of  the  Supreme  Council  of  Calcutta.  In  discharge  of  the 
duties  of  these  lucrative  offices  he  spent  two  years  and  a  half  in 
India,  returning  in  1838. 

On  his  return  from  India  he  professed  himself  anxious  to  with- 
draw from  politics,  and  devote  his  whole  time  to  literature.  He 
had  not  ceased,  even  when  in  India,  to  contribute  to  the  '  Edin- 
burgh Review ' ;  but  he  wished  now  to  settle  down  to  his  great 
project,  the  '  History  of  England  from  the  Accession  of  James  II.' 
This  could  not  be.  His  party  could  npt  yet  dispense  with  him. 
He  was  requested  to  stand  for  Edinburgh,  and  was  elected  in  1839, 
after  very  little  opposition. 

Re-entering  Parliament,  he  was  appointed  Secretary  at  War,  and 
retained  the  office  till  the  fall  of  the  Melbourne  Ministry  in  1841. 
In  the  general  election  of  1841  he  was  re-elected  for  Edinburgh 
without  opposition.  On  the  return  of  the  Whigs  to  power  in 
1846,  he  obtained  the  office  of  Paymaster-General,  and  a  seat  in 
the  Cabinet  of  Lord  John  RusselL  Neither  in  office  nor  in  opposi- 
tion was  he  a  silent  member.  His  voice  was  heard  on  all  questions 
of  importance.  On  all  party  questions  he  stood  by  his  party.  He 
defended  the  war  with  China  in  1840,  assisted  'in  beating  down  the 
Chartists,  assailed  Lord  Ellenborough's  administration  of  India, 
supported  Lord  John  Russell's  motion  for  an  inquiry  into  the 
state  of  Ireland,  and  argued  against  loading  slave-grown  sugar 


80  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

with  heavy  duties.  On  questions  less  strictly  matters  of  party,  he 
showed  Ms  natural  liberality  of  spirit  —  supported  the  increased 
Maynooth  Grant  and  the  abolition  of  Theological  Tests  in  the  Scot- 
tish Universities,  and  resented  in  very  strong  language  the  attempt 
to  deprive  certain  Dissenters  of  their  chapels  on  the  ground  that 
they  did  not  hold  the  opinions  of  the  original  possessors.  In  1841 
he  carried  a  change  in  the  laws  of  copyright  In  1846  he  sup- 
ported an  unsuccessful  bill  for  limiting  the  labour  of  young  persons 
in  factories  to  ten  hours  a-day. 

In  1842  he  published  his  '  Lays  of  Ancient  Rome.'  Both  before 
and  after  this  he  wrote  occasional  verses.  Though  not  quite  so  pop- 
ular as  his  prose,  his  poetry  was  very  widely  read.  Yet  most  people 
would  gladly  forego  his  Lays  for  another  volume  of  the  History. 

In  1844  he  wrote  the  last  of  his  brilliant  essays  to  the  'Edin- 
burgh Review.'  Ambitious  of  distinction  as  an  orator  and  a 
statesman,  he  had  never  renounced  his  literary  ambition.  It  was 
chiefly  on  his  writings  that  he  depended  for  durable  fame.  Even 
during  his  official  residence  in  India  Ije  found  time  to  write  for  . 
the  Review.  These  periodical  contributions  were  now  stopped,  not 
because  he  henceforth  threw  himself  into  politics  with  undivided 
ardour,  but  because  he  was  setting  in  earnest  to  his  projected 
History. 

In  1846  he  was  at  the  height  of  his  political  success.  In  1847 
came  a  change.  He  had  kept  his  seat  for  Edinburgh  since  1839. 
He  had  been  re-elected  in  1841  without  opposition.  But  of  late 
his  conduct  had  been  far  from  satisfactory  to  the  mass  of  the  elec- 
tors. He  had  given  deep  offence  to  churchmen  of  all  sects  by  the 
breadth  of  his  views.  He  had  spoken  in  most  contemptuous  terms 
of  the  persecution  of  Sir  David  Brewster  by  the  Established  clergy ; 
he  had  roused  the  hatred  of  the  Evangelicals  by  advocating  the 
Maynooth  Grant,  and  still  more  by  his  derisive  mention  of  the 
"bray"  of  Exeter  Hall,  and  the  "prescriptive  right"  of  its  fre- 
quenters "to  talk  nonsense."  In  the  general  election  of  1847, 
therefore,  he  stood  third  on  the  poll.  This  may  be  considered  the 
end  of  his  political  life.  He  refused  to  offer  himself  for  another 
seat,  and  retired  to  his  study  and  his  books.  In  1852  the  electors 
of  Edinburgh  returned  him  at  their  own  expense,  unasked,  and 
without  putting  him  to  the  trouble  of  a  canvass ;  but  he  took 
little  part  in  the  business  of  the  House.  His  only  memorable 
speech  was  on  the  exclusion  of  the  Master  of  the  Rolls  from  the 
House  of  Commons,  on  which  occasion  he  is  said  to  have  turned 
the  scale  by  a  hundred  votes. 

In  1849  appeared  the  first  two  volumes  of  his  History.  Very 
few  books  have  been  bought  with  such  avidity.  There  was  a 
demand  for  the  work  such  as  had  not  been  known  since  the  daya 
of  Byron  and  Scott. 


LIFE.  81 

The  second  two  volumes  were  not  published  till  1855.  Expec- 
tation had  been  on  tiptoe,  and  the  rush  was  almost  greater  than 
for  the  first  instalment. 

While  carrying  on  his  History,  he  turned  aside  to  write  for  the 
'  Encyclopedia  Britannica '  some  biographies  that  he  had  more  or 
less  crudely  sketched  in  his  '  Essays ' — the  Lives  of  "  Atterbury  " 
(1853),  "Banyan"  (1854),  "Goldsmith"  (1856),  "Johnson" 
(1856),  and  "Pitt"  (1859).  These  works  are  highly  finished, 
and  are  considered  by  many  to  be  the  most  favourable  specimens 
of  his  style. 

Meantime  honours  were  coming  in  to  crown  his  labours.  In 
1849  he  was  elected  Lord  Rector  of  the  University  of  Glasgow, 
and  was  made  a  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Society.  The  year  1857 
was  especially  fruitful  of  such  rewards  to  successful  toil.  In  tliat 
year  he  was  elected  a  Foreign  Member  of  the  French  Academy, 
and  of  the  Prussian  Order  of  Merit,  High  Steward  of  Cam- 
bridge ;  and  in  the  autumn  he  was  raised  to  the  peerage  as  Baron 
Macaulay  of  Rothley — the  first  literary  man  to  receive  such  a 
distinction. 

He  did  not  long  enjoy  his  honours.  His  multifarious  labours 
began  to  tell  upon  him.  He  was  threatened  with  one  of  the 
maladies  that  too  surely  follow  upon  a  life  of  excitement  and 
overstrained  energy — derangement  of  the  action  of  the  heart 
Latterly  lie  was  prohibited  from  public  speaking :  at  his  instal- 
lation as  High  Steward  of  Cambridge  he  simply  bowed  his  ac- 
knowledgments, and  made  no  speech.  He  had  drafted  and  partly 
written  a  fifth  volume  of  his  History,  but  did  not  live  to  publish 
it.  The  last  composition  published  during  his  life  was  his  bio- 
graphy of  Pitt  H  e  died  at  his  residence,  Holly  Lodge,  Kensington, 
on  the  z8th  of  December  1859. 

We  cannot  say  of  Macaulay  himself  what  he  said  of  Johnson 
— that  we  are  as  familiar  with  his  personal  appearance  as  with 
the  faces  that  have  surrounded  us  from  childhood.  The  explana- 
tion probably  is,  that  there  was  nothing  in  his  appearance  to 
draw  particular  attention.  He  seems  to  have  been  a  fair-com- 
plexioned,  good-looking  man,  about  the  middle  height,  full-bodied, 
and  with  a  tolerably  firm  carriage.  He  is  described  as  "  robust- 
looking."  Crabb  Robinson  says  that  his  features  were  regular, 
but  that  they  had  not  the  delicacy  one  expects  to  see  in  men 
of  genius  and  fine  sensibility.  His  voice  was  strong  and  com- 
manding, but  its  effect  was  marred  by  a  quick  and  excited 
articulation. 

He  had  a  vigorous  constitution.  He  was  one  of  the  favoured 
few  that  draw,  as  De  Quincey  says,  the  double  prize  of  a  fine 
intellect  ami  a  healthy  stomach.  Had  he  been  more  economical 

f 


82  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

of  his  strength,  he  might  have  lived  much  longer  in  full  exercise 
of  his  faculties. 

It  is  often  said  that  a  man's  powers  cannot  be  fairly  valued  till 
several  generations  after  his  death ;  that  his  contemporaries  and 
their  immediate  posterity  can  seldom  judge  with  impartiality. 
Many  persons  repeat  this  dictum  in  something  like  the  above 
form  without  ever  asking  themselves,  What  kind  of  powers  do 
we  mean  ?  If  power  is  taken  to  mean  intellectual  power  as  dis- 
played in  books,  the  dictum  is  probably  true.  We  can  probably 
judge  better  of  the  amount  of  intellect  in  a  book  than  could  have 
been  done  by  the  writer's  contemporaries.  But  while  posterity 
may  give  a  juster  award  as  respects  the  intellectual  power  shown 
in  a  book,  it  is  much  more  likely  to  be  unfair  in  its  judgment  of 
a  man's  general  energy  of  intellect.  Intellect  may  be  thrown  into 
other  things  than  books,  and  if  a  man  dazzles  the  judgment  of 
his  contemporaries,  and  obtains  unmerited  praise  of  his  literary 
productions,  the  reason  in  all  likelihood  is  that  literature  is  not 
his  only  field  of  intellectual  display. 

Macaulay's  brilliant  command  of  expression,  and  confident  and 
plausible  deliverances  on  every  subject  of  human  interest,  furnish 
a  sufficient  explanation  of  the  extraordinary  popularity  of  his 
works.  But  undoubtedly  the  popular  admiration  of  the  man's 
abilities  was  heightened  by  the  current  traditions  of  his  oratory, 
his  powers  of  conversation,  and  his  astonishing  feats  of  memory. 
Everything  combined  to  convey  the  impression  of  amazing  ver- 
satility. Now,  when  his  books  are  calmly  judged,  and  his  work 
estimated  by  special  authorities  in  the  various  fields  that  he 
traversed  with  such  confidence,  there  is  a  danger  that  we  under- 
value his  powers,  and  estimate  his  whole  intellectual  force  by 
the  part  of  it  that  was  spent  upon  his  books.  If  he  wished  his 
fame  to  rest  upon  the  quality,  and  not  upon  the  quantity,  of 
his  literary  productions,  he  should  have  chosen  a  more  limited 
field,  and  not  voraciously  aspired  to  be  pre-eminent  in  three  such 
departments  as  poetry,  history,  and  criticism.  And  if  he  wished 
his  fame  to  rest  upon  his  literary  productions  alone,  whether  in 
their  quantity  or  in  their  quality,  he  should  not  have  dissipated 
his  energies  so  profusely  in  directions  that  are  of  little  avail  for 
permanent  literary  renown.  He  aspired  to  eminence  not  only  as  a 
man  of  letters,  but  as  an  orator  and  as  a  legislator.  Besides  all 
this,  attested  by  substantial  documents,  he  spent,  if  we  may  credit 
circulating  traditions,  an  ordinary  man's  allowance  of  energy  in 
the  excitement  of  conversation,  and  in  the  indulgence  of  an  in- 
continent appetite  for  reading.  In  conversation  he  did  not  give 
and  take  like  De  Quincey :  once  started  on  a  theme,  he  ran  on 
as  in  a  set  prelection,  without  break  or  pause.  As  regards  his 
reading,  the  report  is  that  besides  what  he  read  for  his  literary 


CHARACTER.  83 

works,  he  went  through  thousands  of  novels,  kept  abreast  of  the 
ballad  literature  of  the  streets,  and  attempted  such  freaks  aa 
reading  the  bulky  volumes  of  Chrysostom.  With  all  necessary 
allowance  for  exaggeration,  it  is  evident  that  his  literary  per- 
formances are  far  from  representing  the  whole  of  his  dissipated 
intellectual  force. 

Numerous  testimonies  are  on  record  concerning  his  extraordinary 
powers  of  memory.  The  hyperbolical  expression  that  he  forgot 
nothing,  while  it  goes  very  far  beyond  the  truth,  indicates  signifi- 
cantly what  an  impression  he  made  on  his  contemporaries.  It 
is  the  kind  of  exaggeration  that  makes  heroes  out  of  pre-eminent 
men.  In  his  history  he  often  quotes  the  substance  of  a  document 
instead  of  giving  the  exact  words ;  and  the  reason  was,  that  he 
often  quoted  from  memory.  Several  of  his  essays,  involving 
extensive  ranges  of  matter  of  fact,  were  written,  by  his  own 
statement,  at  a  distance  from  books.  Concerning  his  conversa- 
tion, we  have  several  authentic  anecdotes.  We  learn  from  the 
historian  Prescott  that  he  did  not  go  prepared  on  a  particular 
subject,  and  watch  his  opportunity  to  bring  it  forward,  but 
fluently  quoted  a  profusion  of  facts  and  dates  on  subjects  in- 
troduced by  others.  Washington  Irving  relates  that,  in  historical 
combats  with  Hallam,  Macaulay  quoted  chapter  and  section  as 
if  he  had  had  the  books  before  him.  Another  acquaintance  tells 
us  that,  being  on  one  occasion  convicted  of  a  misquotation  from 
'  Paradise  Lost,'  he  soon  after  offered  himself  for  examination, 
undertaking  to  quote  any  passage  suggested  to  him  in  the  whole 
poem.  Moore's  Diary  contains  several  expressions  of  wonder  at 
the  power  of  his  memory.  At  one  time  in  particular,  says  the 
poet,  "  he  astonished  us  by  repeating  old  Irish  slang  ballads  as 
glibly  as  I  used  to  do  when  a  boy." 

With  such  a  plenitude  of  sheer  retentiveness,  he  combined  a 
large  share  of  the  analogical  faculty.  He  ranged  freely  through 
the  immense  store  of  particulars  that  he  had  accumulated,  drawing 
parallels,  analogies,  an  1  figurative  comparisons  with  vivacious 
facility.  Assert  a  proposition  in  art,  politics,  social  science,  in- 
deed in  any  department  of  human  knowledge,  and  without  a 
moment's  hesitation  lie  would  place  before  you  similar  propositions 
from  various  authors,  and  hosts  of  confirmatory  or  contradictory 
particulars.  He  would  then,  perhaps,  state  a  view  held  by  himself, 
and  support  his  position  by  a  fertile  array  of  instances,  analogies, 
and  similitudes. 

These  brilliant  powers  were  not  without  their  natural  weak- 
nesses. He  was  so  hurried  a  thinker,  he  was  so  enamoured  of 
mere  movement,  that  he  could  not  rest  to  analyse  minutely,  or  to 
make  certain  that  his  instances  and  comparisons  were  exactly 
to  the  point.  True,  he  had  strong  sense,  and  with  his  wide 


84  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

command  of  facts  was  not  likely  to  go  far  astray  on  practical 
questions.  But  compare  him  with  a  calm,  meditative,  original 
writer  like  De  Quincey,  and  you  become  vividly  aware  of  his 
peculiar  deficiency,  as  well  as  his  peculiar  strength ;  you  find  a 
more  rapid  succession  of  ideas  and  greater  wealth  of  illustration, 
but  you  miss  the  subtle  casuistry,  the  exact  and  finished  simili- 
tudes, and  the  breaking  up  of  routine  views.  No  original  opinion 
requiring  patient  consideration  or  delicate  analysis  is  associated 
with  the  name  of  Macaulay.  It  better  suited  his  stirring  and 
excitable  nature  to  apply  his  dazzling  powers  of  expression  and 
illustration  to  the  opinions  of  others.  He  was  quick  to  expose 
false  generalisations  by  producing  contradictory  instances,  and 
he  often  generalised  for  himself  with  the  utmost  boldness ;  but 
none  of  his  original  generalisations  possess  any  importance.  The 
life  of  a  misunderstood  man  like  Goldsmith  is  a  good  test  of  a . 
writer's  power  of  breaking  through  false  traditions.  Macaulay's 
Life  of  Goldsmith  repeats  many  vulgar  errors,  and  contains 
nothing  new  except  the  opinion  that  Goldsmith  was  not  an 
ill-used  man,  but  might  have  lived  comfortably  had  he  been 
provident — an  opinion  resulting  from  strong  unsentimental  sense, 
coupled  with  a  special  eye  for  plain  matters  of  fact.  In  his 
similitudes  and  otherwise,  he  often  errs  against  exact  congruity. 
Describing  Dante's  countenance,  he  places  a  "  sullen  and  con- 
temptuous curve "  upon  the  lip,  a  "  haggard  and  woful  stare " 
in  the  eye — sullenness  and  contempt  upon  one  feature,  and  hope- 
less compassion  upon  another.  Expounding  the  peculiarities  of 
Milton's  similes,  and  enlarging  especially  upon  "  the  extreme  re- 
moteness of  the  associations  by  which  he  acts  upon  the  reader " 
— an  expression,  by  the  way,  somewhat  vague — he  illustrates  his 
meaning  by  saying  that  the  poet  "strikes  the  key-note,  and 
expects  his  hearers  to  make  out  the  melody  " — a  feat  that  v  every 
schoolboy  "  knows  to  be  absurdly  impossible,  there  being  hundreds 
of  different  melodies  starting  from  the  same  key-note. 

As  regards  the  emotional  side  of  the  man.  In  his  writings  he 
appears  buoyant  and  hopeful,  an  optimist,  looking  on  the  bright 
side  of  things,  enthusiastic  in  his  desire  of  progress,  exultingly 
sure  of  its  fulfilment  in  these  latter  days,  confident  in  his  opinions, 
warm  and  open  in  his  expressions  of  like  and  dislike ;  a  man 
"  radiant,"  as  Carlyle  says,  "  with  pepticity,"  without  a  trace 
of  misgiving,  despondency,  or  sourness.  His  sympathies  go  all 
with  the  vigorous  and  hopeful  side  of  human  nature ;  he  ignores 
the  miseries  and  difficulties  of  this  life.  He  would  have  us  believe 
that  human  comfort  is  rapidly  on  the  increase;  that  we  are  rapidly 
nearing  his  millennium,  where  "  employment  is  always  plentiful, 
wages  always  high,  food  always  che;ip,  and  a  large  family  is  con- 


OPINIONS.  85 

sidered  not  as  an  encumbrance  but  as  a  blessing."  "  From  the 
oppressions  of  illiterate  masters,  and  the  sufferings  of  a  degraded 
peasantry,"  his  mind  always  turns  with  delight  to  such  concej>- 
tions  as  "  the  vast  magnificent  cities,  the  ports,  the  arsenals,  the 
villas,  the  museums,  the  libraries,  the  marts  filled  with  every 
article  of  comfort  or  luxury,  the  factories  swarming  with  artisans, 
the  Apennines  covered  with  rich  cultivation  up  to  their  very  sum- 
mits, the  Po  wafting  the  harvests  of  Lombardy  to  the  granaries 
of  Venice,  and  carrying  back  the  silks  of  Bengal  and  the  furs  of 
Siberia  to  the  palaces  of  Milan." 

We  spoke  of  De  Quincey  as  a  man  of  ever-active  imagination, 
often  engaged  in  transmuting  the  scenes  and  characters  of  his 
daily  life  into  food  for  his  aesthetic  sensibilities.  There  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  much  of  this  day-dreaming  turn  in  Macaulay. 
His  energies  were  engrossed  with  actualities,  and  iu  his  over- 
powering love  of  movement  he  hurried  eagerly  from  one  thing  to 
another,  without  staying  to  overlay  them  with  superstructures  of 
the  imagination.  In  his  study  he  did  not  lie  dreaming  on  a  rug 
before  the  fire  with  a  book  in  his  hand,  subjecting  every  new  idea 
to  a  mental  chemistry  of  analysis  and  synthesis,  and  using  it  as  a 
starting-point  for  speculations  of  his  own,  but  sat  in  his  chair  or 
walked  through  the  room  reading,  writing,  and  revising  with  his 
whole  strength.  The  chief  work  of  his  imagination — using  the 
word  in  a  loose  popular  sense — was  to  picture  the  scenes  and 
personages  of  ancient  times  and  distant  countries  as  they  really 
were — the  work  of  what  may  be  called  the  historical  imagination. 
Of  aesthetic  imagination — imagination  properly  so  called,  imagin- 
ation as  a  creative  or  modifying  faculty  engaged  in  building  up 
objects  of  Fine  Art — he  had  little  share.  It  was,  one  may  say, 
pushed  aside  by  other  mental  activities,  and  what  work  it  did 
was  done  in  a  hurry.  His  warmest  admirers  cannot  claim  for  him 
a  high  degree  of  aesthetic  culture.  He  was  too  much  occupied 
with  facts  to  have  time  for  it.  His  '  Lays  of  Ancient  Rome ' 
are  interesting  rather  historically  than  aesthetically.  They  afford 
us  vivid  glimpses  of  Roman  life  and  Italian  scenery.  The  inci- 
dents, the  sayings,  and  the  doings  are  of  the  garish  order  that 
captivates  the  inexperienced  taste. 

Concerning  his  OPINIONS.  In  practical  politics,  as  we  have 
seen,  Macaulay  adhered  to  the  Whigs;  and  generally,  in  ques- 
tions not  identified  with  party,  showed  himself  a  friend  to  reli- 
gious liberty,  and  to  measures  calculated  to  improve  the  condition 
of  the  poorer  classes.  While  he  supported  the  Reform  Bill,  he 
was  averse  to  sweeping  constitutional  changes.  The  Radical  party 
was  his  especial  aversion. 

Theoretical  politics  he  professed  to  regard  with  abhorrence.     He 


86  THOMAS   BABINGTON  MACAULAY. 

scoffed  at  "  metaphysical  "  and  "abstract"  theories  of  government, 
and  treated  with  scorn  the  idea  that  the  lawgiver  can  derive  any 
light  from  general  principles  of  human  nature.  Doubtless  he  was 
prejudiced  against  political  theorists,  because  the  chief  theorists  in 
his  day  were  Radicals.  He  himself  theorised  abundantly  upon 
general  principles  of  human  nature — as,  for  example,  in  his  ac- 
count of  the  Italian  States  in  the  essay  on  Machiavelli ;  and  he 
theorised  under  the  disadvantage  of  not  knowing  that  he  did 
theorise. 

In  his  historical  verdicts,  he  is  accused  of  allowing  his  judgment 
to  be  warped  by  party  feeling.  Perhaps  too  much  has  been  made 
of  this.  His  attachment  to  certain  ideas  was  probably  stronger 
than  his  attachment  to  party.  He  loved  liberty,  justice,  tolera- 
tion, and  the  fair  fame  of  England,  with  the  warmth  of  an  ardent 
nature :  whoever  did  violence  to  these  ideas,  he  hated  as  if  a  per- 
sonal enemy.  He  hated  Laud  as  a  bigot,  and  Charles  as  a  tyrant. 
He  admired  Cromwell  as  the  destroyer  of  a  tyranny.  He  had  not 
the  heart  to  denounce  Cromwell's  usurpation,  partly  because  the 
usurper  used  his  power  with  moderation,  and  did  not  show  a  nar- 
row partiality  for  his  own  sect,  but,  above  all,  because  during  the 
Protectorate  the  name  of  England  was  dreaded  and  respected  on 
the  Continent.  He  was  a  most  ardent  patriot;  to  be  patriotic  was 
an  unfailing  passport  to  his  favour  :  and  such  as  had  betrayed  their 
country  were  subjected  to  a  jealous  valuation,  and  let  off  with 
scant  acknowledgment  of  their  virtues,  and  a  thorough  exposure 
of  their  crimes. 

He  has  left  comparatively  little  literary  criticism,  and  that  little 
is  not  at  all  valuable.  His  deliverance  against  Pope's  "  correct- 
ness," in  his  Essay  on  Byron,  is  sometimes  quoted.  That  his 
pungent  analogies  drive  very  wide  of  the  mark,  the  student  will 
see  by  reading  the  late  Mr  Conington's  Essay  on  Pope,  Oxford 
Essays,  1858. 

Though  in  no  sense  a  man  of  science,  he  pronounces  with  his 
usual  confidence  on  questions  of  philosophy.  He  eulogises  modern 
science  because  it  does  not  "  disdain  the  humble  office  of  minister- 
ing to  the  comforts  of  mankind."  But  he  sees  little  good  in  the 
Inductive  Method.  Tt  has,  he  says,  "  been  practised  ever  since  the 
beginning  of  the  world  by  every  human  being."  He  overlooks  the 
all-important  fact  tliat  it  has  been  practised  only  in  simple  cases, 
and  in  those  imperfectly,  and  that  its  sole  pretension  is  to  make 
available  for  complicated  problems  principles  that  have  been  acted 
upon  and  established  in  cases  of  greater  simplicity.  The  following 
is  a  sharp  criticism  from  the  pen  of  Sir  George  Cornewall  Lewis,  a 
determined  enemy  of  superficial  knowledge  : — 

"I  have  read  Maeaulay's  article  on  Lord  Bacon  in  the  'Edinburgh 
Review.'  It  is  written  iu  his  usual  sparkling,  lively,  antithetical  style, 


SENTENCES.  87 

and  the  historical  part  of  it  is  interesting  and  amusing.  His  remarks  on 
the  ancient  philosophy  are  for  the  most  part  shallow  and  ignorant  in  the 
extreme  ;  his  objections  to  the  utility  of  logic  are  the  stale  commonplaces 
which  all  the  enemies  of  accurate  knowledge,  and  the  eulogists  of  coinmuii- 
nense,  practical  men,  &c. ,  have  always  been  setting  forth." 

ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE 

Vocabulary. 

There  is  little  to  remark  upon  in  Macaulay's  vocabulary  except 
its  copiousness.  lie  has  no  eccentricities  of  diction  like  J  >e  Quineey 
or  Caiiyle  ;  he  employs  neither  slang  nor  scholastic  technicalities, 
and  he  np.vp.r  nyfoig  a  new  word.  He  "IHlTiflt  fe  said  to  use  an  ex- 
cess  of  Latin  words,  and  he  is  not  a  purist  in  the  matter  of  Saxon. 

His  command  of  expression  was  proportioned  to  the  extraordi- 
nary compass  of  his  memory.  The  copiousness  appears  not  so 
much  in  the  Shakspearian  form  of  accumulating  synonyms  one 
upon  another,  as  in  a  profuse  way  of  repeating  a  thought  in  several 
different  sentences.  This  is  especially  noticeable  in  the  opening 
passages  of  some  of  his  Essays.  In  his  review  of  Southey,  for 
example,  he  starts  an  opinion  that  the  laureate's  forte  was  senti- 
ment rather  than  reason,  and  luxuriates  as  if  he  never  would  have 
done  with  his  voluptuous  repetitions  of  the  titillating  doctrine. 

Sentences. 

Macaulay's  is  a  s^ylethj^tjnay  .truly _^e  called  "artificmlj"  from 
his  excessive  use  of  striking  artifices  of  style—  balanced  sentences, 
abrupt  transitions,  and  pointed  figures  of  speech. 

The  peculiarities TJFuHnnWIISlHHinffTBrSyle  are  expressed  in 
such  general  terms  as  "abrupt,"  "pointed,"  "oratorical."  We 
shall  not  attempt  to  gather  together  separately  all  the  elements 
that  justify  these  epithets ;  but,  following  the  order  indicated  in 
the  Introduction,  the  various  particulars  that  go  to  the  making  of 
the  "  abruptness  "  and  the  "  point "  will  be  noticed  as  we  proceed. 

His  sentences  have  the  compact  finish  produced  by  the  frequent 
occurrence  of  the  periodic  arrangement  He  is  not  uniformly 
periodic ;  he  often  prefers  a  loose  structure,  and  he  very  rarely 
has  recourse  to  the  forced  inversions  that  we  find  occasionally  in 
De  Quineey.  Yet  there  is  a  sufficient  interspersion  of  periodic 
arrangements  to  produce  an  impression  of  firmness.  Taken  as  a 
whole,  his  style  is  one  of  the  last  that  we  should  call  loose. 

We  here  speak  of  the  periodic  arrangement  or  structure  as  de- 
fined in  our  Introduction  (p.  5).  If  we  take  the  word  periodic  in 
its  restricted  sense,  we  cannot  describe  Macaulay  as  a  composer  in 
the  periodic  style.  The  "periodic  style,"  in  its  narrower  sense, 
implies  long  and  heavy-laden  sentences,  and  Macaulay's  tendency 
is  towards  the  short  and  light. 


88  THOMAS    BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

Occasionally  he  uses  the  long  oratorical  climactic  period,  consist- 
ing of  a  number  of  clauses  in  the  same  construction  gradually  in- 
creasing in  length  so  as  to  form  a  climax.  Thus — 

"  The  energy  of  Innocent  the  Third,  the  zeal  of  the  young  orders  of  Francis 
and  Dominic,  and  the  ferocity  of  the  Crusaders,  whom  the  priesthood  let 
loose  on  an  un warlike  population,  crushed  the  Albigensiau  Churchea. " 

Again,  in  a  sketch  of  the  Reformation — 

' '  The  study  of  the  ancient  writers,  the  rapid  development  of  the  pcwers 
of  the  modern  languages  the  unprecedented  activity  which  was  displayed  in 
every  department  of  literature,  the  political  state  of  Europe,  the  vices  of  the 
Roman  Court,  the  exactions  of  the  Roman  Chancery,  the  jealousy  with 
which  the  wealth  and  privileges  of  the  clergy  were  naturally  regarded  by 
laymen,  the  jealousy  with  which  Italian  ascendancy  was  naturally  regarded 
by  men  born  on  our  side  of  the  Alps — all  these  things  gave  to  the  teachers  of 
the  new  theology  an  advantage  which  they  perfectly  understood  how  to  use." 

In  the  last  example  there  are  two  climaxes  in  sound. 

A  large  proportion  of  his  sentences  contain  words  and  clauses  in 
formal  balance  ;  but  the  effect  of  this  would  not  be  so  striking  were 
it  not  that  his  composition  contains  so  much  antithesis  in  other 
modes.  The  general  predominance  of  antithesis  we  shall  consider 
in  its  place  under  Figures  of  Speech ;  here  we  have  to  do  properly 
with  balanced  forms,  whether  embodying  antithesis  or  not. 

He  makes  considerable  use  of  conventional  balanced  phrases  for 
amplifying  the  roll  of  the  sentence.  Thus — "  After  full  inquiry, 
and  impartial  reflection  ; "  "  men  who  have  been  tried  by  equally 
strong  temptations,  and  about  whose  lives  we  possess  equally  full 
information ; "  "  no  hidden  causes  to  develop,  no  remote  conse- 
quences to  predict ; "  "  very  pleasing  images  of  paternal  tenderness 
and  filial  duty  ;  "  and  so  forth. 

The  following  is  an  example  of  balance  without  antithesis.  It 
is  valuable  as  an  artificial  mode  of  giving  separate  emphasis  to 
two  things  involved  in  the  same  argument — a  preventive  against 
confusion : — 

"Now  it  does  not  appear  to  us  to  be  the  first  object  that  people  should 
al  A-ays  believe  in  the  established  religion,  or  be  attached  to  the  established 
government.  A  religion  may  be  false.  A  government  may  be  oppressive. 
And  whatever  support  governments  give  to  false  religions,  or  religion  to 
oppressive  governments,  we  consider  as  a  clear  evil." 

While  this  mode  of  statement  has  undeniably  its  advantages,  it 
is  obviously  too  startling  an  artifice  to  be  often  employed.  The 
two  short  sentences,  interjected  without  connectives,  are  examples 
of  one  element  of  our  author's  abruptness. 

The  following  passages  show  balance  combined  with  antithesis: — 

"Thus  the  successors  of  the  old  Cavaliers  had  turned  demagogues;  the 
successors  of  the  old  Roundheads  had  turned  courtiers.  Ynt  was  it  long 


PARAGRAPHS.  89 

before  their  mutual  animosity  began  to  abate  ;  for  it  is  the  nature  of  parties  to 
retain  their  original  enmities  far  more  firmly  than  their  original  principles. 
During  many  years,  a  generation  of  Whigs,  whom  Sidney  would  have 
spurned  as  slaves,  continued  to  wage  deadly  war  with  a  generation  of  Tories 
whom  Jeffreys  would  have  hanged  for  Republicans." 

"With  such  feelings,  both  parties  looked  into  the  chronicles  of  the  middle 
ages.  Both  readily  found  what  they  sought ;  and  both  obstinately  refused 
to  see  anything  but  what  they  sought.  The  champions  of  the  Stuarts  could 
easily  point  out  instances  of  oppression  exercised  on  the  subject.  The  de- 
fenders of  the  Roundheads  could  as  easily  produce  instances  of  determined 
and  successful  Resistance  offered  to  the  Crown.  The  Tories  quoted  from 
ancient  writings  expressions  almost  as  servile  as  were  heard  from  the  pulpit 
of  Mai n waring.  The  Whigs  discovered  expressions  as  bold  and  severe  as 
any  that  resounded  from  the  judgment-seat  of  Bradshaw.  One  set  of  writers 
adduced  numerous  instances  in  which  kings  had  extorted  money  without  the 
authority  of  Parliament.  Another  set  cited  cases  in  which  the  Parliament 
had  resumed  to  itself  the  power  of  inflicting  punishment  on  kings.  Those 
who  saw  only  one  half  of  the  evidence  would  have  concluded  that  the  Plan* 
tagenets  were  as  absolute  as  the  Sultans  of  Turkey ;  those  who  saw  only 
the  other  half  would  have  concluded  that  the  Plan  tagenets  had  as  little  real 
power  as  the  Doges  of  Venice  ;  and  both  conclusions  would  have  beeii 
equally  remote  from  the  truth." 

It  is  a  pretty  general  opinion  among  critics  that  Macaulay  over- 
did this  artifice  of  style.  Even  his  apologist  in  the  '  Edinburgh 
Review '  admitted  that  his  sentences  were  sometimes  "  too  curiously 
balanced."  As  he  himself  said  of  Tacitus — "He  tells  a  fine  story 
finely,  but  he  cannot  tell  a  plain  story  plainly.  He  stimulates  till 
stimulants  lose  their  power."  The  worst  of  it  is  that  exact  balance 
cannot  long  be  kept. up,  as  in  the  above  passage,  without  a  sacrifice 
of  strict  truth ;  both  sides  are  extremely  exaggerated  to  make  the 
antithesis  more  telling. 


Paragraphs. 

i.  The  striking  characteristic  of  abruptness  in  Macaulay 's  style 
is  caused  chiefly  by  his  peculiar  ways  of  transition  and  connection. 
ile  does  not  conduct  us  from  one  statement  to  another  wTtntne 
deliberate  formality  of  De  Quincey.  We  are  seldom  left  in  doubt 
as  to  the  bearing  of  his  statements  ;  but  we  are  often  kept  in  sus- 
pense, and  generally  we  must  make  out  connections  for  ourselves 
without  the  help  of  explicit  phrases. 

Let  us,  for  example,  study  his  way  of  introducing  the  general 
pioposition  italicised  in  the  middle  of  the  following  passage  : — 

"  The  state  of  society  in  the  Neapolitan  dominions,  and  in  some  parts  of 
the  Ecclesiastical  State,  more  nearly  resembled  that  which  existed  in  the 
great  monarchies  of  Europe.  But  the  governments  of  Lombardy  and  Tus- 
cany, through  all  their  revolutions,  preserved  a  different  character.  A  people 
in/ten  assembled  in  a  town  is  far  more  formidable  to'  its  rulers  than  when  dis- 
persed over  a  wide  extent  of  country.  The  most  arbitrary  of  the  Cassars  found 
it  necessary  to  feed  and  divert  the  inhabitants  of  their  unwieldy  capital  at 
the  expense  of  the  provinces.  The  citizens  of  Madrid  have  more  than  once 


90  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAT. 

besieged  their  sovereign  in  his  own  palace,  and  extorted  from  him  the  most 
humiliating  concessions.  The  Sultans  have  often  been  compelled  to  pro- 
pitiate the  furious  rabble  of  Constantinople  with  the  head  of  an  unpopular 
vizier.  From  the  same  cause  there  was  a  certain  tinge  of  democracy  in  the. 
monarchies  and  aristocracies  of  Northern  Italy." 

The  general  proposition  is  introduced  abruptly.  We  are  expect- 
ing a  statement  about  the  governments  of  Lombardy  and  Tuscany, 
when,  with  a  sudden  jerk,  the  circle  of  our  vision  is  widened,  and 
we  are  presented  with  a  general  comparison  between  the  govern- 
ment natural  to  cities  and  the  government  natural  to  country 
districts.  If  we  are  familiar  with  the  subject,  and  if  our  attention 
is  fully  awake,  we  at  once  have  a  dim  perception  of  the  writer's 
drift,  and  read  on  till  it  is  distinctly  enunciated.  But  undoubtedly 
the  sudden  transition  has  an  abrupt  effect  It  has  not  the  equable 
smoothness  of  De  Quincey's  transitions.  The  artifice  is  not  unlike 
the  common  practice  of  beginning  an  essay  with  a  statement  that 
has  no  obvious  connection  with  the  title.  We  feel  a  momentary 
astonishment,  and  we  are  put  upon  our  mettle  to  anticipate  the 
application.  To  be  sure,  these  unapplied  generalities  have  not 
quite  so  much  of  an  abrupt  effect  when  they  come  upon  us  at  the 
beginning.  At  the  beginning  our  attention  is  supposed  to  be  free. 
Nothing  has  gone  before  to  preoccupy  us  except  the  title.  At  any 
point  in  the  body  of  the  essay  our  attention  is  supposed  to  be  en- 
grossed with  the  particular  subject  of  exposition ;  and  we  start 
when  the  expected  flow  of  the  discourse  is  suddenly  checked,  and 
we  are  jerked  upon  a  new  line.  ,  . 

So  much  for  the  abrupt  introduction  of  generalities.  Any  page 
of  Macaulay  will  furnish  the  reader  with  other  examples.  The 
first  sentence  of  the  above  passage  illustrates  another  mode  of 
abrupt  transition.  The  subject  of  the  paragraph  is  the  government 
of  the  States  of  Lombardy  and  Tuscany ;  but  the  paragraph  opens 
with  a  statement  concerning  the  government  of  the  Neapolitan 
dominions.  Instead  of  laying  down  directly  the  state  of  society  in 
Lombardy  and  Tuscany,  he  begins  with  an  independent  assertion 
about  the  state  of  society  in  the  Neapolitan  dominions.  He  has 
been  describing  Lombardy  and  Tuscany;  and  the  reader  is  expected 
to  understand,  without  any  explicit  connective,  that  the  assertion 
about  the  Neapolitan  States  is  meant  as  a  contrast  The  effect  is 
very  much  the  same  as  is  produced  by  the  sudden  introduction  of 
a  generality.  We  presently  see  the  drift  of  the  statement,  yet  we 
experience  a  momentary  astonishment.  This  mode  of  construction 
is  much  in  favour  with  Macaulay.  We  are  constantly  being  jerked 
away  from  the  immediate  subject,  and  jerked  back  with  a  "  but." 
Thus,  in  a  disquisition  on  the  dramatists  of  the  Restoration,  he 
suddenly  opens  a  new  paragraph  with  the  statement — 

' '  In  the  old  drama  there  had  been  much  that  was  reprehcnsibla '' 


PARAGRAPHS.  91 

This  is  not,  as  we  might  suppose,  the  opening  of  a  digression  on 
the  old  drama.  He  is  merely  taking  a  step  out  of  the  subject  that 
he  may  return  with  greater  force.  The  next  sentence  is — 

"  But  whoever  compares  even  the  least  decorous  plays  of  Fletcher  with 
those  contained  in  the  volume  before  us,  will  see  how  much  the  proHigaey 
which  follows  a  period  of  overstrained  austerity  goes  beyond  the  profligacy 
•which  precedes  such  a  period. " 

In  the  same  Essay  a  paragraph  on  the  morality  of  Greek  writings 
proceeds  as  follows  : — 

"The  immoral  English  writers  of  the  seventeenth  century  are  indeed 
much  less  excusable  than  those  of  Greece  and  Rome.  But  the  worst  English 
writings  of  the  seventeenth  century  are  decent,  compared  with  much  tiiat 
has  been  bequeathed  to  us  by  Greece  and  Rome.  Plato,  we  have  little 
doubt,  was  a  much  better  man  than  Sir  George  Etherege.  But  Plato  has 
written  things  at  which  Sir  George  Etherege  would  have  shuddered." 

The  effect  of  these  sudden  interruptions  of  continuity  is  still 
more  abrupt  when  the  contrasting  statement  is  introduced,  as  it 
were,  in  fragments.  Thus,  towards  the  close  of  a  flowing  declama- 
tion on  the  beneficial  influence  of  the  Romam  Catholic  Church  in 
the  dark  ages,  he  staggers  us  by  abruptly  declaring — 

"The  sixteenth  century  was  comparatively  a  time  of  light." 

Of  this  fragmentary  statement  we  can  make  nothing.  We  stumble 
on,  bewildered,  to  the  next : — 

"Yet  even  in  the  sixteenth  century  a  considerable  number  of  those  who 
quitted  the  old  religion  followed  the  first  confident  and  plausible  guide  who 
offered  himself,  and  were  soon  led  into  errors  far  more  serious  than  they  had 
renounced." 

Now  we  can  guess  at  his  drift,  and  pass  lightly  over  a  sentence  of 
examples — 

"Thus  Matthias  and  Kniperdoling,  apostles  of  lust,  robbery,  and  murder, 
•were  able  for  a  time  to  rule  great  cities  " — 

reaching  the  explicit  statement  of  the  idea  in  the  following 
sentence : — 

"  In  a  darker  age  such  false  prophets  might  have  founded  empires  ;  and 
Christianity  might  have  been  distorted  into  a  cruel  and  licentious  supersti- 
tion, more  noxious  not  only  than  Popery,  but  even  than  Islamism." 

Apart  from  the  abruptness  of  these  sudden  and  discontinuous 
changes  of  subject,  the  introduction  of  generalities,  contrasting 
statements,  qualifications,  and  suchlike,  before  we  know  formally 
their  bearing  upon  the  subject  in  hand,  has  something  of  the  effect 
of  the  periodic  structure  upon  a  larger  scale :  we  are,  as  in  an 
expanded  period,  kept  in  suspense  until  the  application  is  fully 
developed. 


92  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

2.  The  rule  of  Parallel  Construction  is  that  "  when  several  con- 
secutive sentences  iterate  or  illustrate  the  same  idea,  they  should, 
as  far  as  possible,  be  formed  alike."  Macaulay  observes  this  rule 
better  perhaps  than  any  of  our  popular  writers.  With  his  natural 
sense  of  perspicuous  effect,  he  felt  the  advantage  of  keeping  the 
principal  subject  prominent  throughout  all  the  sentences  of  a 
paragraph. 

He  i.s  far,  indeed,  from  being  perfect.  Thus,  in  the  passage 
recently  quoted  concerning  the  Italian  States,  the  illustrations  of 
the  general  principle  invert  the  position  of  the  leading  subject. 
The  general  proposition  is  made  concerning  the  people,  and  two 
of  the  illustrations  are  stated  as  if  the  subject  of  discourse  had 
been  the  despots  and  their  hardships.  Consider,  for  instance,  the 
first  illustration : — 

"The  most  arbitrary  of  the  Caesars  found  it  necessary  to  feed  and  divert 
the  inhabitants  of  their  unwieldy  capital  at  the  expense  of  the  provinces." 

Here  the  phrase  "at  the  expense  of  the  provinces"  is  improperly 
prominent:  who  paid  the  bill  is  a  matter  of  no  importance ;  the 
point  is  that  the  inhabitants  of  Rome  extorted  the  treat  Let  us 
put  it  as  follows  : — 

"The  inhabitants  of  the  unwieldy  capital  cf  the  Caesars  exac  cd  expensive 
bounties  of  food  and  diversion  from  the  most  arbitrary  of  their  masters." 

Our  amendment  may  be  less  elegant,  but,  in  that  particular  con- 
nection, it  is  more  perspicuous. 

Though  open  to  improvement,  Macaulay  undoubtedly  owes  not 
a  little  of  his  perspicuity  to  the  observance  of  this  rule.  Whole 
paragraphs  might  be  quoted  containing  little  or  nothing  to  alter  ; 
particularly  when  he  exerts  himself  to  give  a  sustained  account  of 
an  institution  or  an  individual — the  Roman  Catholic  Church  or 
Hyder  AIL  When  he  does  not  give  the  leading  place  to  the 
principal  subject,  he  awards  it  to  some  subject  introduced  in  his 
peculiar  way  for  purposes  of  contrast,  and  for  the  time  occupying 
the  foreground  in  the  exposition. 

The  uses  of  parallel  structure  may  be  studied  to  advantage  in 
Macaulay.  Usually  but  slight  alterations  are  required,  and  no 
harm  need  be  done  to  the  variety  of  his  expression.  .  The  follow- 
ing is  another  good  case  where  some  slight  changes  make  an 
obvious  improvement.  The  passage  occurs  in  an  exposition  of 
the  theme  that  "  No  men  occupy  so  splendid  a  place  in  history  as 
those  who  have  founded  monarchies  on  the  ruins  of  republican 
institutions  "  : — 

"  In  nations  broken  to  the  curb,  in  nations  long  accustomed  to  be  trans- 
ferred from  one  tyrant  to  another,  a  man  without  eminent  qualities  may 
easily  gain  supreme  power.  The  defection  of  a  troop  of  guards,  a  conspiracy 
of  eunuchs,  a  popular  tumult,  might  place  an  indolent  senator  or  a  brutal 


PARAGRAPHS.  93 

soldier  on  the  throne  of  the  Roman  world.  Similar  revolutions  have  often 
occurred  in  the  despotic  States  of  Asia.  But  a  community  which  has  heard 
the  voice  of  truth  and  experienced  the  pleasures  of  liberty,  in  which  the 
merits  of  statesmen  and  of  systems  are  freely  canvassed,  in  which  obedience 
is  paid  not  to  persons  but  to  laws,  in  which  magistrates  are  regarded  not  as 
the  lords  but  as  the  servants  of  the  public,  in  which  the  excitement  of  party 
is  a  necessary  of  life,  in  which  political  warfare  is  reduced  to  a  system  of 
tactics ;  such  a  community  is  not  easily  reduced  to  servitude." 

The  subject  being  the  grandeur  of  men  that  have  made  themselves 
absolute  over  free  institutions,  it  would  obviously  conduce  to  per- 
spicuity to  make  that  subject  prominent  throughout,  as  it  is  in 
the  first  sentence.  The  conclusion  of  the  last  sentence  drops  the 
usurper  altogether,  and  lets  the  pervading  idea  slip  out  of  clear 
comprehension  into  vagueness.  Let  us  try  the  effect,  as  regards 
clearness,  of  some  such  alterations  as  the  following : — • 

"  In  the  Roman  world  an  indolent  senator  or  a  brutal  soldier  might  be 
placed  on  the  imperial  throne  by  the  defection,  &c.  ;  and  similar  revolutions 
have  often  occurred  in  the  despotic  States  of  Asia.  But  in  a  community, 
&c. ;  in  a  community  thus  free  and  enlightened,  only  men  of  rare  genius 
for  command  can  hope  to  obtain  the  mastery." 

3.  The  opening  sentence  in  his  paragraphs  is  not  always  a  clue 
to  the  main  subject  Of  this  we  have  had  an  example. 

One  of  his  great  arts  of  surprise  is  to  occupy  the  first  sentences 
of  the  paragraph  with  circumstances  leading  us  to  expect  the  op- 
posite of  what  is  really  the  main  statement.  Very  often  all  the 
sentences  up  to  the  last  are  a  preparation  for  the  shock  of  aston- 
ishment administered  at  the  close.  We  are  told  what  ought  to 
have  happened,  what  was  expected  to  happen,  or  what  happened 
in  some  other  age  or  country  under  similar  circumstances,  before 
we  reach  the  gist  of  the  paragraph,  which  is  to  tell  us  what  really 
happened  in  some  particular  case.  The  following  paragraph  is 
constructed  on  this  plan  : — 

"  No  part  of  the  system  of  the  old  Church  had  been  more  detested  by  the 
Reformers  than  the  honour  paid  to  celibacy.  They  held  that  the  doctrine 
of  Rome  on  this  subject  had  been  prophetically  condemned  by  the  apostle 
Paul  as  a  doctrine  of  devils  ;  and  they  dwelt  much  on  the  crimes  and  scan- 
dals which  seemed  to  prove  the  justice  of  this  awful  denunciation.  Luther 
had  evinced  his  own  opinion  in  the  clearest  manner,  by  espousing  a  nun. 
Rome  of  the  most  illustrious  bishops  and  priests  who  had  died  by  fire  during 
the  reign  of  Mary  had  left  wives  and  children.  Now,  however,  it  began  to 
be  rumoured  that  the  old  monastic  spirit  had  reappeared  in  the  Church  of 
England  ;  that  there  was  in  high  quarters  a  prejudice  agninst  married  priests  ; 
that  even  laymen,  who  called  themselves  Protestants,  had  made  resolutions 
of  celibacy  which  almost  amounted  to  vows;  nay,  that  a  minister  of  the 
established  religion  had  set  up  a  nunnery,  in  which  the  psalms  were  chanted 
at  midnight  by  a  company  of  virgins  dedicated  to  God." 

Tn  such  paragraphs,  to  indicate  the  drift  at  the  beginning  would 
alter  the  character  of  the  composition.  But  in  many  cases  the. 


94  THOMAS   BABINGTON    MACAULAY. 

delay  of  the  main  proposition  is  purposeless,  and  serves  only  to 
confuse.  Thus,  in  a  paragraph  detailing  the  circumstances  that 
made  it  impossible  to  transfer  to  the  King  of  England  the  eccle- 
siastical supremacy  of  the  Pope,  he  begins — 

"The  immediate  effect  of  the  Reformation  in  England  was  by  no  means 
favourable  to  political  liberty.  The  authority  which  had  been  exercised  by 
the  Popes  was  transferred  almost  entire  to  the  King.  Two  formidable  powers 
which  had  often  served  to  check  each  other  were  united  in  a  single  despot. 
If  the  system  on  which  t,he  founders  of  the  Church  of  England  acted  could 
have  been  permanent,  the  Reformation  would  have  been  in  a  politic.il  sense 
the  greatest  curse  that  ever  fell  on  our  country.  But  that  system  carried 
•within  it  the  seeds  of  its  own  death."  (And  so  on  through  a  long  para- 
graph. ) 

We  do  not  catch  the  drift  of  the  paragraph  until  we  reach  the 
fourth  sentence,  and  we  do  not  know  that  it  is  the  key  to  the  sub- 
ject till  we  have  read  the  whole.  An  ordinary  reader,  asked  to 
summarise  such  a  paragraph  after  a  single  perusal,  would  give  but 
a  poor  account  of  it.  He  would  naturally  recall  the  first  sentences, 
and  comparing  these  with  the  tenor  of  the  latter  part  of  the  para- 
graph, would  almost  to  a  certainty  founder  in  the  attempt  to  recon- 
cile them.  It  would  have  been  far  better  to  begin  with  the  fourth 
sentence.  This,  though  not  a  direct  statement  of  the  substance  of 
the  paragraph,  states  it  by  implication.  The  three  first  sentences 
should  be  thrown  into  their  natural  position  of  subordination.  We 
should  then  have  some  such  opening  as  follows  : — 

"  If  the  system  on  which  the  founders  of  the  Church  of  England  acted 
could  have  been  permanent,  the  Reformation  would  have  been  in  a  political 
sense  the  greatest  curse  that  ever  fell  on  our  country.  At  first,  indeed,  it 
seemed  by  no  means  favourable  to  political  liberty.  Th«  authority  exercised 
by  the  Popes  was  transferred  almost  entire  to  the  King.  Two  formidable 
powers  that  had  often  served  to  check  each  other  were  united  in  a  single 
despot.  But  this  union  could  not  last ;  the  appearance  of  danger  soon 
vanished." 

His  paragraphs  often  begin  with  one  or  more  short  sentences, 
recapitulating  the  previous  paragraph.  It  is  a  good  deal  a  matter 
of  taste ;  but  probably  most  authorities  would  prefer  that  these 
short  sentences  were  prefixed  to  the  real  substance  of  the  paragraph 
in  the  form  of  clauses.  Thus,  take  his  account  of  the  reaction  of 
public  feeling  after  the  warm  reception  of  William  and  Mary : — 

"  The  ill-humour  of  the  clergy  and  of  the  army  could  not  but  be  noticed 
by  the  most  heedless ;  for  the  clergy  and  the  army  were  distinguished  by 
obvious  peculiarities  of  garb.  '  Black  coats  and  red  coats,"  said  a  vehement 
Whig  in  the  House  of  Commons,  'are  the  curses  of  the  nation.'  But  the 
discontent  was  not  confined  to  the  black  coats  and  the  red  coats." 

Now  the  discontent  among  the  other  classes  being  the  subject  of 
the  paragraph,  many  would  prefer  to  have  all  the  above  condensed 
into  one  sentence,  in  some  such  way  as  follows : — 


PARAGRAPHS.  95 

"  Although  the  ill-humour  of  the  clergy  and  the  army  could  not  fail  to  be 
most  remarked,  distinguished  as  they  were  from  other  classes  by  their  pecu- 
liar garb  ('black  coats  and  red  coats.'  said  a  vehement  Whig  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  'are  the  curses  of  the  nation'),  yet  the  clergy  and  the  army 
were  not  the  only  discontented  classes. " 

4.  Dislocation. — In  delineating  a  character,  or  in  giving  an 
account  of  a  town,  he  would  not  seem  to  have  bestowed  much 
attention  on  the  order  of  the  circumstances  in  his  statement. 

To  take  an  example  from  the  celebrated  third  chapter  of  his 
History : — 

"Norwich  was  the  capital  of  a  large  and  fruitful  province.  It  was  the 
residence  of  a  bishop  and  of  a  chapter.  It  was  the  chief  seat  of  the  chief 
manufacture  of  the  realm.  Some  men  distinguished  by  learning  and 
science  had  recently  dwelt  there  ;  and  no  place  in  the  kingdom,  except  the 
capital  aud  the  universities,  had  more  attractions  for  the  curious.  The 
library,  the  museum,  the  aviary,  and  the  botanical  garden  of  Sir  Thomas 
Browne,  was  thought  by  the  Fellows  of  the  Royal  Society  well  worthy  of  a 
long  pilgrimage.  Norwich  had  also  a  court  in  miniature." 

(Here  follows  a  picturesque  account  of  the  mansion  of  the  Dukes 
of  Norwich  ;  their  state — the  golden  goblets,  silver  tongs  and 
shovels,  paintings,  gems;  a  picturesque  description  of  the  festive 
reception  of  Charles  II.  in  1671 ;  a  similar  description  of  the  re- 
turn of  the  Duke  of  Norwich.  After  this  the  paragraph  closes 
abruptly  with  the  statement — ) 

"  In  the  year  1693,  the  population  of  Norwich  was  found,  by  actual  enu- 
meration, to  be  between  twenty-eight  and  twenty-nine  thousand  souls." 

Now  here  the  statement  that  Norwich  was  the  chief  seat  of  the 
chief  manufacture  of  the  realm  deserved  to  be  made  more  promi- 
nent. Further,  there  is  some  confusion  in  thrusting  it  in  between 
the  bishop  and  the  literary  celebrities  ;  it  has  more  natural  affinity 
with  the  largeness  and  f  ruitf ulness  of  the  province,  and,  if  it  is  use- 
ful to  preserve  continuity  of  ideas,  should  have  been  placed  next 
to  the  first  sentence.  The  number  of  the  population  comes  in  very 
abruptly:  seeing  that  he  makes  the  population  his  first  care  in  this 
chapter,  and  maintains  it  to  be  the  most  important  fact,  one  is  sur- 
prised that  he  did  not  observe  on  the  small  scale  what  he  considered 
advisable  on  the  great  scale. 

The  paragraphs  of  this  same  third  chapter  are  a  very  good  study 
upon  this  point  of  arrangement,  and  afford  scope  for  a  great  deal  of 
casuistry.  If  we  take  the  chapter  as  a  whole,  the  order  and  pro- 
portion of  the  statements  are  open  to  many  objections.  It  may, 
indeed,  be  doubted  whether  there  is  in  the  chapter  any  principle 
either  of  order  or  of  proportion.  One  statement  seems  to  suggest 
another ;  at  the  end  the  reader  feels  that  he  has  passed  through  a 
brilliant  muddle ;  whether  he  has  obtained  the  complete  Pisgah 


96  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

view  promised  him  at  the  beginning,  he  cannot  say;  he  is  only 
sure  that  he  has  been  highly  entertained. 

5.  Unity. — His  natural  clearness  taught  him  the  propriety  oi 
confining  each  paragraph  to  a  single  subject.     He  is,  however, 
open  to  considerable  improvement,  as  students  will  have  no  diffi- 
culty in  seeing  when  they  take  him  rigidly  to  task. 

As  regards  irrelevant  digressions,  he  is  singularly  correct  He 
is  one  of  our  most  consecutive  writers — perhaps  among  writers  of 
popular  literature  the  most  consecutive.  This  makes  him  a  most 
profitable  study  for  the  distribution  of  matter  into  paragraphs: 
the  general  run  of  his  composition  being  consecutive,  slight  altera- 
tions bring  him  into  conformity  with  the  most  rigid  rules. 

6.  Some  of  the  peculiarities  already  commented  on  involve  a 
breach  of  the  sixth  rule  of  the  paragraph — namely,  that  subordinate 
statements  should  be  kept  in  their  proper  place. 

His  trick  of  taking  an  explanatory  statement  out  of  the  sentence, 
and  stating  it  by  itself  as  an  independent  fact,  is  a  blemish  of 
this  kind.  The  abrupt  defect  is  due  to  its  unexpected  and  undue 
prominence. 

His  short  sentences  often  err  against  the  same  canon.  A  number 
of  examples  that  should  be  comprised  in  one  sentence  receive  a 
sentence  each.  A  statement  is  repeated  in  two  parts,  and  each 
part  is  honoured  with  a  separate  sentence. 

These  transgressions  are  seldom  of  a  kind  to  cause  confusion, 
and  many  people  who  like  to  be  startled  by  such  rattling  fireworks 
will  think  the  breach  of  the  rule  more  admirable  than  the  observ- 
ance. The  student  must  judge  for  himself,  and  be  fully  persuaded 
in  his  own  mind.  If  he  take  a  paragraph  of  Macaulay's,  he  will 
find  that  by  slight  changes,  sometimes  by  a  change  of  punctuation, 
he  can  moderate  the  abrupt  statements  into  their  fitting  harmony 
with  the  main  theme ;  let  him  return  to  the  passage  after  a  time, 
compare  his  own  version  with  the  original,  and  judge  as  impar- 
tially as  he  can  which  of  the  two  has  the  most  pleasing  effect 

A  wider  consideration  might  be  raised  under  this  head.  Does 
not  Macaulay,  in  the  exuberance  of  his  powers  of  language  and 
illustration,  sometimes  dwell  longer  than  necessary  on  a  simple 
topic  ?  Doubtless  he  does  illuminate  with  superfluous  profusion 
subjects  that  stand  in  no  great  need  of  illumination.  The  fluent 
abundance  of  examples  and  comparisons,  while  it  puts  his  meaning 
beyond  doubt,  is  often  greater  than  the  subject  demands.  Instance 
is  piled  upon  instance  and  comparison  upon  comparison,  where  a 
bare  statement  would  be  enough  to  make  the  meaning  clear  to  the 
smallest  capacity.  For  example,  in  his  Essay  on  Addison,  he  takes 
occasion  to  controvert  Dr  Johnson's  account  of  Boileau's  views 
concerning  modern  Latin.  Boileau,  he  says,  had  not  an  "  in- 
judicious contempt  for  modern  Latin  ; "  he  only  "  thought  it  prob- 


FIGURES  OF  SPEECH.  97 

able  that  in  the  best  modern  Latin  a  writer  of  the  Augustan  age 
would  detect  ludicrous  improprieties ; "  and  he  was  quite  right  in 
thinking  so.  This,  one  would  think,  is  tolerably  clear  without 
farther  expansion.  But  Macaulay  goes  on  to  cite  no  less  than 
three  parallel  cases  of  the  difficulty  of  mastering  a  foreign  idiom. 

"What  modern  scholar  can  honestly  declare  that  he  sees  the  smallest 
impurity  in  the  style  ol  Livy  ?  Yet  is  it  not  certain  that  in  the  style  of 
Livy,  Pollio,  whose  taste  had.  been  formed  on  the  banks  of  the  Tiber,  de- 
tected the  inelegant  idiom  of  the  Po  ?  Has  any  modern  scholar  understood 
Latin  better  than  Frederic  the  Great  understood  French?  Yet  is  it  not 
notorious  that  Frederic  the  Great,  after  reading,  speaking,  writing  French, 
and  nothing  but  French,  during  more  than  half  a  century,  after  unlearning 
his  mother  tongue  in  order  to  leam  French,  after  living  familiarly  during 
many  years  with  French  associates,  could  not,  to  the  last,  compose  in  French, 
without  imminent  risk  of  committing  some  mistake  which  would  have 
moved  a  smile  in  the  literary  circles  of  Paris  ? " 

In  like  manner,  the  works  of  Scott  and  Eobertson  contain  Scot- 
ticisms "at  which  a  London  apprentice  would  laugh." 

This  excess  of  particularity  is  an  error  on  the  right  side  for 
popular  success.  The  multiplication  of  instances  may  be  over- 
done ;  but  if  the  language  is  fresh  and  varied,  general  readers  will 
take  a  good  deal  before  they  complain  of  a  surfeit.  The  language, 
however,  must  be  fresh  and  varied ;  of  this  condition  a  writer 
should  make  sure  before  trying  to  imitate  Macaulay. 

If  the  student  wishes  to  conform  his  style  to  the  general  judg- 
ment of  critics,  he  must  not  imitate  Macaulay  too  absolutely ;  he 
must  endeavour  to  be  more  varied  in  the  forms  of  his  sentences,  to 
aim  less  frequently  at  contrasts,  to  study  more  carefully  the 
placing  of  important  words,  and,  above  all,  to  make  a  more 
moderate  use  of  abrupt  transitions. 

Figures  of  Speech. 

"Splendour  of  Imagery" — The  eulogists  of  Macaulay's  style 
rarely  fail  to  include  among  its  beauties  great  "  splendour  of 
imagery."  Now,  if  under  "imagery"  may  be  included  compari- 
sons and  contrasts  of  every  description,  as  well  as  every  kind  of 
picturesque  circumstances,  he  is  no  doubt  fully  entitled  to  the 
phrase.  But  if  imagery  means  no  more  than  pictorial  similitudes, 
then,  compared  with  such  writers  as  Carlyle  and  Burke,  he  cannot 
be  called  a  master  of  splendid  imagery. 

In  his  earlier  essays,  he  shows  an  obvious  straining  after  in- 
genious conceits.  His  Essay  on  Milton  is,  as  he  said  himself  in 
later  years,  "overloaded  with  gaudy  and  ungraceful  ornament." 
In  essays  written  before  he  was  thirty,  there  are  probably  twice  as 
many  similes  as  in  all  his  subsequent  writings.  His  "  Milton  " 

e 


98  THOMAS  BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

contains  as  many  as  any  six  of  his  later  essays.  The  History  is 
studiously  plain,  so  far  at  least  as  regards  figurative  ornament. 

Undoubtedly,  his  similitudes  are  often  brilliantly  ingenious,  and 
expressed  with  his  usual  richness  and  felicity  of  language.  But 
they  are  too  artificial  and  gaudy  finery  to  be  worthy  of  serious 
imitation. 

Real  Comparisons. — Out  of  the  resources  of  his  prodigious 
memory,  Macaulay  was  able  to  elucidate  a  point  much  more 
vividly  than  by  figurative  comparisons.  Whatever  he  undertakes 
to  depict,  whether  persons,  places,  or  things,  he  is  able  to  compare 
them  at  all  points  with  other  objects  of  the  same  kind  ;  he  is  able 
to  make  what  are  technically  called  "  real  comparisons  "  ;  and  thus 
conveys  a  livelier  impression  of  their  salient  attributes  than  if  he 
compared  them  with  objects  having  less  in  common.  It  is  need- 
less to  multiply  examples  of  what  may  be  found  in  almost  every 
page.  We  take  as  specimens  four  from  the  first  few  pages  of  his 
History : — 

"  Hengist  and  Horsa,  Vortigern  and  Rowena,  Arthur  and  Mordrod,  are 
mythical  persons,  whose  very  existence  may  be  questioned,  and  whose  ad- 
ventures must  be  classed  with  those  of  Hercules  and  Romulus." 

"What  the  Olympian  chariot-course  and  the  Pythian  oracle  were  to  all 
the  Greek  cities,  from  Trebizond  to  Marseilles,  Rome  and  her  bishop  were  to 
all  Christians  of  the  Latin  communion,  from  Calabria  to  the  Hebrides." 

"The  same  atrocities  which  had  attended  the  victory  of  the  Saxon  over 
the  Celt  were  now,  after  the  lapse  of  ages,  suffered  by  the  Saxon  at  the  hand 
of  the  Dane. " 

"  The  Court  of  Rouen  seems  to  have  been  to  the  Court  of  Edward  the 
Confessor  what  the  Court  of  Versailles  long  afterwards  was  to  the  Court  of 
Charles  the  Second. " 

Perhaps  the  most  forcible  of  his  comparisons  are  those  intended 
to  reverse  a  common  prejudice,  or  drive  home  an  unfamiliar  view. 
Thus,  in  the  beginning  of  his  History,  he  falls  foul  of  English 
historians  for  expatiating  with  exultation  on  the  power  and  splen- 
dour of  our  French  kings : — 

"This,"  he  says,  "is  as  absurd  as  it  would  be  in  a  Haytian  negro  of  our 
time  to  dwell  with  national  pride  on  the  greatness  of  Lewis  the  Fourteenth, 
and  to  speak  of  Blenheim  and  Ramilies  with  patriotic  regret  and  shame. 
.  .  .  One  of  the  ablest  among  them,  indeed,  attempted  to  win  the  hearts 
of  his  English  subjects  by  espousing  an  English  princess.  But  by  many  of 
his  barons  this  marriage  was  regarded  as  a  marriage  between  a  white  planter 
and  a  quadroon  girl  would  now  be  regarded  in  Virginia." 

So,  to  illustrate  how  completely  the  popular  element  had  been  sub- 
verted, in  the  monarchies  of  the  Continent,  he  says — 

"The  privileges  of  the  States-General,  of  the  States  of  Brittany,  of  the 
States  of  Burgundy,  are  now  matters  of  as  little  practical  importance  as  the 
constitution  of  the  Jewish  Sanhedrim  or  of  the  Amphictyonic  Council." 

Very  often  the  comparisons  are  made  in  an  abbreviated  form, 


FIGURES  OF   SPEECH.  99 

like  the  figure  of  synecdoche,  in  which  an  individual  stands  as  the 
type  of  a  species.     Thus — 

"Scotsmen,  whose  dwellings  and  whose  food  were  as  wretched  as  those  of 
the  Icelanders  of  our  time,  wrote  Latin  verse  with  more  than  the  delicacy  of 
Vida,  and  made  discoveries  in  science  which  would  have  added  to  the  renown 
of  Galileo.  Ireland  could  boast  of  no  Buchanan  or  Napier." 

In  like  manner,  but,  to  speak  technically,  with  more  of  the 
genuine  Antonomasia,  be  says  that  had  Bacon  given  to  Literature 
the  time  that  he  gave  to  Law  and  Politics,  "he  would  have  been 
not  only  the  Moses  but  the  Joshua  of  philosophy."  William  could 
have  gained  the  cordial  support  of  the  Whigs  only  "  by  becom- 
ing the  most  factious  man  in  his  kingdom,  a  Shaftesbury  on  the 
throne." 

Further,  the  greater  number  of  his  comparisons  are  not  allega- 
tions of  similarity.  The  characteristic  Macaulayan  comparison  is 
more  a  contrast  than  a  parallel — is,  indeed,  the  form  of  secondary 
contrast  specified  as  the  contrast  between  the  individual  members 
of  a  comprehensive  class.  Thus,  take  poets :  he  seems  to  have 
poets  and  their  productions  ranged  on  a  scale  of  merit ;  and  when 
a  particular  poet  or  production  comes  up,  he  places  them  above 
or  below  some  other,  or  between  some  two.  Maohiavelli's  "  Mau- 
dragola  is  superior  to  the  best  of  Goldoni,  and  inferior  only  to  the 
best  of  Moliere."  Byron's  letters  from  Italy  "are  less  affected 
than  those  of  Pope  and  Walpole ;  they  have  more  matter  in  them 
than  those  of  Cowper."  Addison's  Epistle  to  Lord  Halifax  "  con- 
tains passages  as  good  as  the  second-rate  passages  of  Pope,  and 
would  have  added  to  the  reputation  of  Parnell  or  Prior."  Again, 
"We  need  not  hesitate  to  admit  that  Addison  has  left  us  some 
compositions  which  do  not  rise  above  mediocrity,  some  heroic 
poems  hardly  equal  to  ParnelTs,  some  criticism  as  superficial  as  Dr 
Blair's,  and  a  tragedy  not  very  much  better  than  Dr  Johnson's." 
What  he  does  with  poets,  he  does  in  a  greater  or  less  degree  with 
statesmen,  generals,  and  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men  that  cross 
his  narratives. 

Figures  of  Contrast. — We  have  already  noticed  incidentally  our 
author's  lavish  use  of  antithesis.  The  contrasts  are  really  more 
numerous  than  might  be  thought  at  first  glance ;  the  bare  frame- 
work is  so  overlaid  and  disguised  by  the  extraordinary  fulne.ss  of 
expression  that  many  of  them  escape  notice.  When  we  look  nar- 
rowly, we  see  that  there  is  a  constant  play  of  antithesis.  Not  only 
is  word  set  off  against  word,  clause  against  clause,  and  sentence 
against  sentence.  There  are  contrasts  on  a  more  extensive  scale; 
one  group  of  sentences  answers  to  another,  and  paragraphs  are 
balanced  against  paragraphs.  His  pages  are  illuminated  not  only 
by  little  sparks  of  antithesis,  but  by  broad  flashes. 


100  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

Enough  has  been  given  in  illustration  of  the  minuter  play  of 
antithesis.  Pupils  in  composition  may  be  exercised  in  referring 
examples  to  the  various  modes  of  antithesis,  extreme  and  second- 
ary. Here  it  may  not  be  superfluous  to  dwell  at  some  length  upon 
a  few  of  our  author's  more  prominent  ways  of  manufacturing  this 
stage-lightning  in  its  ampler  forms. 

He  deals  very  largely  in  what  is  technically  known  as  obverse 
statement ;  and  gives  it  a  peculiar  abrupt  point  by  denying  the 
negative  before  affirming  the  positive.  In  explaining  his  abrupt 
transitions  \VP  called  attention  to  something  of  this  nature :  we 
remarked  on  one  example  (p.  90),  that  before  affirming  that  a 
certain  form  of  government  prevailed  in  one  tract  of  country,  he 
affirmed  that  it  did  not  prevail  in  another.  As  another  example, 
take  the  following  passage  from  a  disquisition  on  the  style  of 
Johnson  : — 

"  Mannerism  is  pardonable,  and  is  sometimes  even  agreeable,  when  the 
manner,  though  vicious,  is  natural.  Few  readers,  for  example,  would  be 
willing  to  part  with  the  mannerism  of  Milton  or  of  Burke.  But  a  manner- 
ism which  does.not  sit  easy  on  the  mannerist,  which  has  been  adopted  on 
princi|(le,  and  whif.li  can  bo  sustained  only  by  constant  effort,  is  always 
offensive.  And  such  is  the  mannerism  of  Johnson." 

There  is  a  go-id  deal  of  antithetic  pungency  in  thus  taking  the 
obverse  first.  We  expect,  from  the  general  tone  of  his  remarks, 
that  he  means  to  condemn  the  mannerism  of  Johnson,  and  we  start 
with  surprise  when  he  abruptly  declares  that  "mannerism  is  par- 
donable." "What!"  flashes  across  our  mind,  "Johnson's  man- 
nerism 1 "  We  eagerly  read  on,  and  are  pleasingly  reassured  when 
we  see  the  qualification — "when  the  manner,  though  vicious,  is 
natural."  Nor  is  this  the  only  startle  we  receive  in  the  course  of 
the  short  paragraph  ;  there  is  another  shock  in  reserve  to  keep  our 
attention  awake.  We  have  been  called  away  from  some  minute 
particulars  about  Johnson  to  this  general  principle,  and  the  illus- 
tration of  it  from  remote  quarters.  At  the  end  of  the  paragraph 
we  are  brought  abruptly  back  to  Johnson — "  And  such  is  the  man- 
nerism of  Johnson."  Many  writers  would  have  executed  neither 
of  these  brilliant  turns.  Many  would  have  begun  by  saying  that 
the  mannerism  of  Johnson  is  unpardonable,  and  would  then  have 
proceeded  to  state  why  it  is  so,  and  then,  perhaps,  by  way  of  coun- 
ter-illustration, would  have  explained  when  mannerism  is  pardon- 
able. Macaulay's  order  of  statement  would  thus  have  been  in- 
verted, and  the  contrast,  brought  in  by  an  equable  transition, 
wouM  have  produced  a  much  less  flashing  effect. 

A  favourite  and  characteristic  way  of  getting  up  an  antithesis 
is,  before  narrating  an  event,  to  recount  all  the  circumstances  that 
concurred  to  make  it  different  from  what  it  ultimately  proved  to 
be.  Thus,  before  narrating  Frederick  the  Great's  breach  of  faith 


FIGURES -OF  SPEECH.  101 

with  Maria  Theresa,  he  describes  the  Pragmatic  Sanction,  and  di- 
lates upon  the  considerations  weighing  with  the  various  European 
Governments  to  make  them  observe  what  they  had  stipulated.  In 
like  manner,  he  contrasts  the  general  expectation  before  an  event 
with  the  event  itself.  A  good  example  of  this  is  his  account  of 
the  disbanding  of  Cromwell's  veterans  : — 

"  The  troops  were  now  to  be  disbanded.  Fifty  thousand  men,  accustomed 
to  the  profession  of  arms,  were  at  once  thrown  on  the  world ;  and  experience 
seemed  to  warrant  the  belief  that  this  change  would  produce  much  misery 
and  crime,  that  the  discharged  veterans  would  be  seen  begging  in  every 
street,  or  would  be  driven  by  hunger  to  pillage.  But  no  such  result  fol- 
lowed. In  a  few  months  there  remained  not  a  trace  indicating  that  the 
most  formidable  army  in  the  world  had  just  been  absorbed  into  the  mass  of 
the  community.  The  Royalists  themselves  confessed  that  in  every  depart- 
ment of  honest  industry,  the  discarded  warriors  prospered  beyond  other 
men  ;  that  none  was  charged  with  any  theft  or  robbery ;  that  none  was  heard 
to  ask  an  alms ;  and  that,  if  a  baker,  a  mason,  or  a  waggoner  attracted 
notice  by  his  diligence  and  sobriety,  he  was  in  all  probability  one  of  Oliver's 
old  soldiers." 

Another  favourite  device  is  in  the  course  of  his  narrative  to 
speculate  what  might  have  happened  had  the  circumstances  been 
different  He  does  this  at  every  turning-point  in  English  history. 
The  struggle  between  Crown  and  Parliament  might  have  come  on 
early  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  had  not  intestine  quarrels  been 
suspended  in  the  face  of  a  common  danger.  Had  the  administra- 
tion of  James  been  able  and  splendid,  the  Parliament  might  have 
been  suppressed,  and  the  Crown  become  absolute.  In  like  manner, 
upon  the  execution  of  Charles  L,  the  fall  of  Richard  Cromwell,  the 
Restoration,  and  the  Revolution,  he  pauses  to  imagine  what  might 
have  been  the  course  of  events  had  they  been  directed  by  men  of 
different  character.  The  same  vein  of  reflection  is  continually 
cropping  up  in  all  his  narratives. 

Everywhere  in  his  writings  we  can  trace  the  dominating  love  of 
antithesis.  His  "  celebrated  third  chapter "  sustains  the  excite- 
ment of  paradox  through  more  than  a  hundred  pages.  In  his  His- 
tory the  conflict  of  opposing  parties  affords  him  constant  opportu- 
nities. What  the  one  party  thought  of  a  particular  measure  is  set 
off  against  what  the  other  party  thought ;  "  the  temper  of  the 
Whigs  "  is  contrasted  with  the  "  temper  of  the  Tories."  We  are 
kept  in  the  seat  of  judgment  till  we  have  heard  the  historian  plead 
first  on  the  one  side,  and  then,  still  more  convincingly,  on  the 
other. 

In  the  delineation  of  characters  he  finds  greater  scope  for  his 
favourite  effect.  In  these  pictures,  the  scintillations  of  antithesis 
are  almost  incessant. 

Antithesis  is  such  an  undeniable  advantage  in  the  statement  of 
a  fact,  as  a  means  of  awakening  us  to  its  full  import,  that  it  is  hard 


102  THOMAS  BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

to  say  in  any  particular  case  that  Macaulay  was  at  fault  in  using 
an  antithetic  form  of  statement  That  he  was  not  too  pointed  for 
the  mass  of  readers  was  shown  by  their  eagerness  in  running  after 
his  productions.  That  he  was  too  abrupt  and  startling  for  refined 
judges  of  composition  is  no  less  apparent  by  the  unanimity  of  their 
condemnation.  We  have  seen  what  the  '  Edinburgh  Review '  said 
about  the  "too  curious  balance"  of  his  sentences:  the  same  pre- 
sumably partial  authority  allows  that  he  employed  "  unnecessary 
antithesis  to  express  very  simple  propositions." 

The  great  objection  to  the  frequent  use  of  antithesis,  as  already  . 
observed,  is  the  danger  of  its  betraying  a  writer  into  exaggerations, 
into  deepening  the  shadow  and  raising  the  light.  It  is  not  denied 
that  Macaulay  has  a  tendency  to  make  slight  sacrifices  of  truth  to 
antithesis.  The  chapter  on  the  state  of  society  in  1685  has  been 
convicted  of  many  exaggerated  statements  by  less  dazzling  anti- 
quarians. In  his  numerous  comparisons  between  different  men,  he 
unquestionably  tampers  with  the  realities  for  the  sake  of  enhancing 
the  effect.  He  exaggerates  the  melancholy  of  Dante's  character  on 
the  one  hand,  and  the  cheerfulness  of  Milton's  on  the  other ;  he 
puts  too  strongly  the  purely  illustrative  character  of  Dante's  similes 
in  contradistinction  to  the  purely  poetic  or  ornamental  character  of 
Milton's.  So  he  probably  overstates  the  shallowness  and  flippancy 
of  Montesquieu,  to  heighten  by  contrast  the  solidity  and  stateliness 
of  Machiavelli. 

He  seems  to  have  been  aware  of  his  turn  for  exaggeration,  and 
provides  an  excuse  for  it  A  slightly  over-coloured  statement  rouses 
lethargy,  and  does  not  leave  upon  the  mind  a  false  impression.  The 
hurried  reader  remembers  but  faintly.  The  impression  carried  away 
from  an  exaggerated  statement  is  probably  nearer  the  truth  than  if 
the  statement  had  been  literally  exact 

Such  doctrine  is,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  dangerous.  There  is, 
however,  one  case  where  antithetic  exaggeration  may  be  useful.  A 
skilful  writing-master,  when  dealing  with  pupils  that  have  a  ten- 
dency to  write  a  cramped  hand,  trains  them  to  a  more  flowing  pen- 
manship by  giving  them  liberty  to  make  extravagant  flourishes, 
and  by  encouraging  them  to  exaggerate  the  final  limbs  of  their  mx 
and  ns.  On  the  same  principle,  a  teacher  of  composition,  dealing 
with  tame  pupils,  may  train  them  to  a  bolder  movement  by  allow- 
ing them  to  exaggerate  freely  for  purposes  of  antithesis. 

JSpigram, — Macaulay  delights  in  epigrams.  There  is  a  dash  of 
epigram  in  his  unexpected  transitions.  His  antithesis  often  takes 
an  epigrammatic  point  The  arts  of  surprise  being  so  predominant 
in  his  style,  we  may  quote  a  few  specimens  of  this  the  most  piquant 
of  those  arts  : — 

"  Cranmer  could  vindicate  himself  from  the  charge  of  being  a  heretic  only 
by  arguments  which  uiudo  hiui  out  to  be  a  murderer." 


FIGURES  OF   SPEECH.  103 

"  They  valued  a  prayer  or  a  ceremony,  not  on  account  of  the  comfort 
which  it  conveyed  to  themselves,  but  on  account  of  the  vexation  which  it 
gave  to  the  Roundheads  ;  and  were  so  far  from  being  disposed  to  purchase 
union  by  concession,  that  they  objected  to  concession,  chiefly  because  it 
tended  to  produce  union." 

"  One  thing,  and  one  thing  only,  could  make  Charles  dangerous — a  violent 
death.  .  .  .  His  subjects  began  to  love  his  memory  as  heartily  as  they 
had  hated  his  person  ;  and  posterity  has  estimated  his  character  from  hif 
death  rather  than  from  his  life." 

"The  great  ruling  principle  of  his  [Robert  Walpole's]  public  conduct  was 
indeed  a  love  of  peace,  but  n<>t  in  the  sense  in  which  Archdeacon  Coxe  uses 
the  phrase.  The  peace  which  Walpole  sought  was  not  the  peace  of  the  coun- 
try, but  the  peace  of  his  own  administration." 

"  There  can  be  no  greater  error  than  to  imagine  that  the  device  of  meeting 
the  exigencies  of  the  State  by  loans  was  imported  into  our  Island  by  William 
the  Third.  From  a  period  of  immemorial  antiquity  it  had  been  the  practice 
of  every  English  Government  to  contract  debts.  What  the  Revolution  in- 
troduced was  the  practice  ol  honestly  paying  them." 

"The  town  of  Bedford  probably  contained  more  than  one  politician  who, 
after  contriving  to  raise  an  estate  by  seeking  the  Lord  during  the  reign  of 
the  saints,  contrived  to  keep  what  he  had  got  by  persecuting  the  saints  dur- 
ing the  reign  of  the  strumpets  ;  and  more  than  one  priest  who,  during  re- 
peated changes  in  the  discipline  and  doctrines  of  the  Church,  had  remained 
constant  to  nothing  but  the  benefice." 

"The  Puritan  hated  bear-baiting,  not  because  it  gave  pain  to  the  bear, 
but  because  it  gave  pleasure  to  the  spectators.  Indeed  he  generally  con- 
trived to  enjoy  the  double  pleasure  of  tormenting  both  spectators  and 
bear." 

The  art  of  the  following  is  essentially  epigrammatic.  The 
piquancy  arises  from  the  unexpected  deliverance  of  such  incon- 
gruities in  the  same  sentence : — 

"  They  therefore  gave  the  command  to  Lord  Galway,  an  experienced 
veteran,  a  man  who  was  in  war  what  Moliere's  doctors  were  in  medicine, 
who  thought  it  much  more  honourable  to  fail  according  to  rule,  than  to 
succeed  by  innovation,  and  who  would  have  been  very  much  ashamed  of 
himself  if  he  had  taken  Monjuich  by  means  so  strange  as  those  which 
Peterborough  employed.  This  great  commander  conducted  the  campaign 
of  1707  in  the  most  scientific  manner.  On  the  plain  of  Almanza  he  en- 
countered the  army  of  the  Bourbons.  He  drew  up  his  troops  according  to 
the  methods  prescribed  by  the  best  writers,  and  in  a  few  hours  lost  eighteen 
thousand  men,  a  hundred  and  tioenty  standards,  att  his  baggage,  and  all  his 
artillery." 

Climax. — A  rhetorician  of  so  decided  a  turn  as  Macaulay  could 
not  fail  to  use  the  rhetorician's  greatest  art.  In  every  paragraph 
that  rises  above  the  ordinary  level  of  feeling,  we  are  conscious  of 
being  led  on  to  a  crowning  demonstration.  , 

His  arts  of  contrast  already  exemplified  have  the  effect  of 
making  a  climax.  See  particularly  the  quotations  at  pp.  93, 
101.  He  seems  to  pause  in  the  course  of  his  narrative  or  his 


104  THOMAS   BABINGTON    MACAULAY. 

argument,  and  go  back  for  a  race  that  will  carry  him  sweepingly 
over  the  next  obstacle.  As  another  example  of  this  climactic  use 
of  contrast,  take  the  following  about  Burke.  He  is  comparing 
Bacon  and  Burke  as  two  men  whose  later  writings  are  more 
ornamented  than  their  earlier : — 

"  In  his  youth  he  wrote  on  the  emotions  produced  by  mountains  and 
cascades,  by  the  masterpieces  of  painting  and  sculpture,  by  the  faces  and 
necks  of  beautiful  women,  in  the  style  of  a  parliamentary  report.  In  his 
old  age  he  discussed  treaties  and  tariffs  in  the  most  fervid  and  brilliant 
language  of  romance.  It  is  strange  that  the  '  Essay  on  the  Sublime  and 
Beautiful, '  and  the  '  LetteY  to  a  Noble  Lord'  should  be  the  productions  of 
one  man.  But  it  is  tar  more  strange  that  the  essay  should  have  been  a 
production  of  his  youth  and  the  letter  of  his  old  age." 

In  stating,  as  his  manner  is,  the  various  motives  that  impel 
different  parties  at  particular  conjunctures,  he  is  careful  to  re- 
serve the  most  telling  for  the  end,  and  artfully  prepares  the 
way  for  the  final  resolution. 

One  of  his  most  studied  attempts  at  climax  is  the  famous 
passage  about  Charles  in  the  Essay  on  Milton. 

The  only  other  Figure  of  Speech  that  is  a  marked  ingredient  in 
Macaulay's  style  is  Hyperbole.  An  exaggerated  turn  of  expression 
is  one  of  the  main  elements  of  his  animated  manner :  it  will  be 
fully  discussed  under  the  quality  of  Strength. 


QUALITIES   OP   STYLB. 

Simplicity. 

Macaulay's  composition  is  as  far  from  being  abstruse  as  printed 
matter  can  well  be.  One  can  trace  in  his  writing  a  constant  effort 
to  make  himself  intelligible  to  the  meanest  capacity.  He  loves  to 
dazzle  and  to  argue,  but  above  everything  he  is  anxious  to  be 
understood.  His  ideal  evidently  is  to  turn  a  subject  over  on 
every  side,  to  place  it  in  all  lights,  and  to  address  himself  to 
every  variety  of  prejudice  and  preoccupation  in  his  audience. 

Yet  his  simplicity  is  very  different  from  the  simplicity  of  such 
•writers  as  Goldsmith  and  Paley.  His  is  far  from  being  a  homely 
style.  He  does  not  studiously  affect  Saxon  terms.  Without 
being  so  scholastic  and  technical  as  De  Quincey,  he  is  not  scrup- 
ulous about  using  words  of  Latin  origin,  and  admits  many  terms 
that  Dean  Alford  would  have  excluded  from  "the  Queen's  Eng- 
lish." Besides,  although  he  were  an  Anglo-Saxon  Pharisee  in  his 
choice  of  words,  his  turns  of  expression  are  not  simple  in  the  sense 
of  being  familiar  and  easy.  His  balanced  sentences,  abrupt  tran- 
sitions, pointed  antitheses,  and  climactic  arrangement,  elevate  him 


SIMPLICITY.  1 05 

out  of  the  ranks  of  homely  authors,  and  constitute  him,  as  we  have 
said,  pre-eminently  artificial. 

What  is  it,  then,  that  makes  him  so  easily  understood  ?  For 
ojne  ^thing,  he  seldom  meddles  with  abstruse  problems.  He  does 
not,  like  De  Quincey,  delight  to  match  his  ingenuity  against 
difficulties ;  he  does  not  choose  a  stibject  because  it  has  baffled 
everybody  else :  his  pleasure  is  to  do  brilliantly  what  everybody 
can  do  in  a  manner.  De  Quincey  wrote  upon  Pope  and  Shak- 
speare  because  perplexities  had  settled  upon  their  lives.  Macaulay 
takes  up  only  biographies  whose  principal  incidents  are  known  and 
read  by  all  men  —  the  lives  of  Atterbury,  Bunyan,  Goldsmith, 
Johnson,  Pitt.  He  does  not  covet  openings  for  nice  speculation. 
When  a  recondite  question  crosses  his  path,  he  provides  an  answer 
so  simple  and  easy  that  the  cautious  reader  doubts  whether  it  is 
completa  He  makes  Shakspeare  the  result  of  the  Reformation ; 
Wordsworth  the  result  of  the  French  Revolution ;  Byron  "  the 
interpreter  between  Wordsworth  and  the  multitude."  In  dis- 
cussing the  life  of  Bacon,  he  finds  it  necessary  to  give  his  opinion 
of  the  inductive  method.  The  opinion  is  very  plausible ;  but 
scientific  authorities  pronounce  it  "ignorant  and  shallow  in  the 
extreme."  In  his  life  of  Machiavelli,  he  undertakes  to  account 
for  the  peculiar  state  of  Italian  society  in  the  fourteenth  century. 
The  explanation  is  most  simple :  the  Italians  were  given  to 
commerce  and  literature ;  they  employed  mercenaries  to  fight 
their  battles ;  the  mercenaries  were  treacherous,  —  hence  they 
ceased  to  depend  upon  war  for  effecting  their  desires :  they  came 
to  despise  courage  and  honour  intrigue ;  to  think  it  contemptible 
to  do  by  force  what  could  be  done  by  fraud.  With  all  its  simpli- 
city, the  explanation  is  far  from  satisfactory ;  it  begins  at  too  late 
a  point.  It  does  not  explain  why  the  Italians  turned  to  commerce 
and  literature,  and  paid  the  natives  of  ruder  countries  to  do  their 
fighting.  If  we  knew  that,  we  should  probably  find  that  the 
treachery  of  the  mercenaries  encourage),  and  did  not  originate, 
cowardice  and  intrigue:  a  people  originally  indisposed  to  fight 
their  own  battles  were  not  likely  at  any  time  to  excel  in  the 
active  virtues.  Further,  the  employment  of  mercenaries  was  only 
one  of  many  causes  tending  to  encourage  the  practice  and  admira- 
tion of  dishonest  dexterity. 

In  like  manner  in  his  History,  with  all  his  unexampled  know- 
ledge of  facts,  and  of  every  variety  of  opinion  avowed  by  opposite 
parties,  he  still  shows  a  disposition  to  put  up  with  pat  and  easy 
explanations  of  events.  For  example,  he  explains  the  hostility 
of  the  clergy  to  the  Revolution  by  the  fact  that  it  controverted 
flatly  all  their  favourite  doctrines  about  non-resistance  and  passive 
obedience.  This  is  a  most  acceptable  theory ;  it  refers  us  to  a 
well-known  weakness  of  human  nature:  yet  who  that  has  read 


106  THOMAS   BABIKGTON   MACAT7LAY. 

Macaulay's  own  picture  of  the  multitude  of  conflicting  interests 
then  prevalent  will  believe  that  this  was  the  sole  cause  of  the 
clerical  disaffection  ? 

Another  example  of  his  love  of  simple  explanations  is  seen  in 
the  prominence  he  everywhere  gives  to  the  doctrine  of  reaction. 
The  discontent  under  Cromwell  and  under  William  is  compared 
to  the  discontent  under  Moses ;  and  all  such  cases  are  spoken  of 
as  reactions  of  feeling.  So  the  "appalling  outbreak  of  licentious- 
ness "  after  the  Restoration  is  explained  as  the  natural  result  of 
the  Puritan  austerity.  In  all  these  instances  the  alleged  law  ia 
a  familiar  fact  of  our  nature ;  and  we  are  willing  to  accept  it  as 
a  full  explanation,  though  it  is  far  from  being  so. 

He  is.  then,  readily  understood,  because  he  deals  with  familiar 
subjects;  and  explains  difficulties  by  a  reference  to  familiar  things. 
But  this  is  only  a  small  element  of  his  intelligibility.  The  main 
element  is  hi^elose  and  constant  adherence  to  the  concrete. 

The  terse  abstract  statement  so  familiar  to  the  reader  of  John- 
son, occurs  but  rarely  in  Macaulay,  and  only  as  a  variety  of  expres- 
sion. He  discusses  ftTerytfring  in  th,e  concrete.  When  he  states 
an  abstract  proposition,  unless  it  is  all  the  more  familiar,  he 
follows  it  up  with  a  plethora  of  particular  cases.  We  have  seen 
(p.  97)  that  his  prodigious  knowledge  of  particulars  betrays  him 
into  a  superfluity  of  illustration. 

In  describing  the  conduct  of  individuals,  he  is  not  content  with 
general  terms :  he  does  not  simply  style  them  brave,  or  just,  or 
sagacious  ;  he  compares  them  with  some  well-known  embodiment 
of  these  qualities,  or  relates  significant  circumstances.  Thus,  in  a 
passage  already  referred  to,  he  says  that  "had  the  administration 
of  James  been  able  and  splendid,  it  would  probably  have  been 
fatal  to  our  country."  Many  writers  would  have  been  content 
with  this  plain  statement,  but  Macaulay  goes  on  to  say : — 

"  Had  he  been,  like  Henry  the  Fourth,  like  Maurice  of  Nassau,  or  like 
Gustavus  Adolphus,  a  valiant,  active,  and  politic  ruler,  had  he  put  himself 
nt  the  head  of  the  Protestants  of  Europe,  had  he  gained  great  victories  over 
Tilly  and  Spinolu,  had  he  adorned  Westminster  with  the  spoils  of  Bavarian 
monasteries  and  Flemish  cathedrals,  had  he  hung  Austrian  and  Castilian 
banners  in  Saint  Paul's,  and  had  he  found  himself,  after  great  achieve- 
ments, at  the  head  of  fifty  thousand  troops,  brave,  well  disciplined,  and 
devotedly  attached  to  his  person,  the  English  Parliament  would  soon  have 
been  nothing  more  than  a  uame." 

In  conveying  an  idea  of  the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of  England, 
instead  of  plunging  into  details  and  bald  generalities,  he  hits  them 
off  boldly  by  stating  the  position  of  the  Church  of  England  rela- 
tively to  other  Churches,  and  enlivens  the  comparison  with  the 
names  of  representative  nieu  : — 


CLEARNESS.  107 

"To  this  day  the  constitution,  the  doctiines,  and  the  services  of  the 
Church,  retain  the  visible  marks  of  the  compromise  from  which  she  sprang. 
She  occupies  a  middle  position  between  the  Churches  of  Rome  and  Genera. 
Her  doctrinal  confessions  and  discourses,  composed  by  Protestants,  set  lorth 
principles  of  theology  in  which  Calvin  or  Knox  would  have  found  scarcely  a 
word  to  disapprove.  Her  prayers  and  thanksgivings,  derived  from  the  an- 
cient liturgies,  are  very  generally  such  that  Bishop  Fisher  or  Cardinal  Pole 
might  have  heartily  joined  in  them.  A  controversialist  who  puts  an  Armin- 
ian  sense  on  her  articles  and  homilies,  will  be  pronounced  by  candid  men 
to  be  as  unreasonable  as  a  controversialist  who  denies  that  the  doctrine  of 
baptismal  regeneration  can  be  discovered  in  her  liturgy." 

In  stating  quantity  or  dimension,  he  adds  to  the  dry  unremem- 
berable  ciphers  a  comparison  with  some  similar  case  in  the  lump. 
His  "  third  chapter  "  is  much  indebted  to  this  art  of  relieving  the 
tedious  quotation  of  figures.  Thus — 

"Cornwall  and  Wales  at  present  yield  annually  near  fifteen  thousand 
tons  of  copper,  worth  near  a  million  and  a  half  sterling — that  is  to  say, 
worth  about  twice  as  much  as  the  annual  produce  of  all  English  mines  of  all 
descriptions  in  the  seventeenth  century." 

In  like  manner  he  substitutes  familiar  ways  of  reckoning  time 
in  place  of  the  precise  notation  by  dates.  Thus,  in  describing  the 
amalgamation  of  races  after  the  Conquest,  he  says : — 

"The  great-grandsons  of  those  who  had  fought  under  William,  and  the 
great-grandsons  of  those  who  had  fought  under  Harold,  began  to  draw  near 
to  each  other  in  friendship  ;  and  the  fij-st  pledge  of  their  reconciliation  was 
the  Great  Charter,  won  by  their  united  exertions  and  framed  for  their  com- 
mon benefit." 

His  way  of  dealing  with  cumbrous  qualifications,  explanations, 
and  examples,  is  not  an  unmixed  gain  in  the  direction  of  sim- 
plicity. His  method  is,  as  we  have  seen,  to  make  all  such  state- 
ments in  separate  sentences,  instead  of  joining  them  to  the  main 
statement  in  the  same  sentence.  So  far  this  is  a  gain  :  the  mind 
is  engaged  with  one  thing  at  a  time ;  it  is  asked  to  take  in  the 
several  statements  one  by  one,  instead  of  getting  them  all  at 
once  along  with  an  indication  of  their  relationships.  But  this 
very  severality  of  statement  leads  to  confusion  :  the  mind  having 
grasped  the  separate  facts,  receives  no  clue  to  their  mutual  bear- 
ings, and  is  placed  in  danger  of  bewilderment. 

There  is  a  way  out  of  the  difficulty — namely,  to  make  the  quali- 
fications and  explanations  as  few  as  possible.  This  is  hardly  legiti- 
mate ;  yet  we  have  seen  that  Macaulay  is  suspected  of  adopting  it. 

Clearness. 

In  the  Introduction  (p.  17)  we  mentioned  Macaulay  as  one  of 
the  writers  whose  style  justifies  a  subdivision  of  Clearness  into 
Perspicuity  and  Precision.  He  is  perspicuous,  but  not  precise. 

To  say  that  "  not  an  ambiguous  sentence  is  to  be  found  through- 


108  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

oat  his  works,"  is  attributing  a  perfection  hardly  possible  for 
mortal  writer.  Doubtless  very  few  of  his  sentences  are  ambigu- 
ous, even  at  first  glance ;  and  in  several  that  do  mislead  on  first 
inspection,  the  meaning  is  not  hard  to  find.  His  general  method 
is  decidedly  perspicuous,  although,  as  we  have  seen  in  discussing 
his  paragraphs,  it  also  comes  short  of  perfection,  and  is  open  to 
amendment.  His  numerous  examples  and  comparisons  conduce 
greatly  to  perspicuity.  And,  finally,  his  extraordinary  number  of 
contrasts  is  a  help  in  the  same  direction. 

While  Macaulay  is  one  of  the  most  perspicuous  of  English 
writers,  he  has  no  claim  to  the  merit  of  being  minutely  exact. 
We  have  seen  that,  after  stating  a  general  principle,  he  makes  his 
meaning  perspicuous — clear  in  its  leading  outlines — by  a  free 
quotation  of  examples.  But  he  quotes  his  examples  roundly  and 
confidently;  he  very  seldom  pauses  to  take  note  of  casuistical 
objections,  of  special  circumstances  making  a  particular  case  doubt- 
ful as  an  example  of  his  general  assertion  :  Frederick  the  Great  is 
a  typical  .German,  and  commits  blunders  in  French  that  would 
have  moved  a  smile  in  the  literary  circles  of  Paris ;  Sir  Walter 
Scott  is  a  typical  Scotsman,  and  he  perpetrates  Scotticisms  that  a 
London  apprentice  would  laugh  at ;  Ben  Jonson  was  a  great  man, 
Hoole  a  very  small  man — yet  Ben  Jonson's  verse  was  rugged,  and 
Hoole,  as  coming  after  Pope,  poured  out  decasyllabic  verses  in 
thousands,  "  all  as  well  turned,  as  smooth,  and  as  like  each  other 
as  the  blocks  which  have  passed  through  Mr  Brunei's  mill  in  the 
dockyard  at  Portsmouth."  In  like  manner  his  comparisons  are 
perspicuous,  are  good  as  broad  indications  of  his  general  meaning ; 
but  they  have  the  same  defect — a  defect  for  certain  purposes  at 
least — of  not  being  nicely  pointed  to  the  relevant  circumstances, 
of  not  entering  into  exact  details.  We  get  but  a  vague  notion  of 
the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of  England  from  the  statement  that 
"  she  occupies  a  middle  position  between  the  Churches  of  Rome 
and  Geneva ; "  and  little  distinct  information  about  Addison's 
Epistle  from  the  statement  that  "  it  contains  passages  as  good  as 
the  second-rate  passages  of  Pope,  and  would  have  added  to  the 
reputation  of  Parnell  or  Prior."  It  is  not  by  such  rough  asser- 
tions that  accurate  knowledge  is  imparted ;  they  convey  rather  the 
conceit  of  knowledge  than  the  reality ;  they  are  simple  but  vague. 

When  we  insist  upon  Macaulay's  want  of  minute  exactness, 
of  all  pretension  to  be  called  an  accurate  writer,  it  is  but  fair  to 
notice  that  minute  exactness,  scrupulous  accuracy,  did  not  accord 
with  the  popular  design  of  his  works.  He  wrote  for  hurried 
readers,  and  more  to  amuse  or  interest  than  to  instruct.  He 
considered  that  "laborious  research  and  minute  investigation" 
belonged  to  authors  by  profession.  We  can  excuse  a  want  of 
exactness  in  a  writer  so  anxious  to  make  his  language  perspicu- 


STKENGTH.  109 

OUB.  For  his  perspicuity  he  certainly  deserves  all  praise ;  and  it  is 
always  right  to  point  out  that  from  this  very  quality  his  inexact- 
ness is  easily  discovered,  and  that  he  passes  for  shallow  in  many 
quarters  where  a  more  shallow  and  at  the  same  time  more  obscure 
writer  would  pass  for  profound.  Particularly  is  he  admirable  for 
his  profuseness  of  exemplification :  he  often  supplies  us  with  the 
means  of  correcting  his  own  indistinct  generalities.  Even  his 
comparisons  to  individuals  and  specific  institutions,  though  vague, 
are  seldom  misleading  :  if  they  convey  little  substantial  knowledge, 
they  at  least  convey  no  error.  For  such  comparisons  it  may  al- 
ways be  pleaded  that  they  awaken  curiosity,  and  set  the  inquirer 
on  the  right  track  ;  if  we  desire  fuller  information,  they  direct  us 
where  to  look  for  it  In  a  hasty  review  of  the  doctrines  of  the 
Church  of  England,  it  is  perhaps  best  to  incite  the  reader  to  com- 
pare them  with  the  doctrines  of  other  Churches ;  and  where  limits 
preclude  a  full  discussion,  to  furnish  no  more  detail  than  an  index 
map. 

Strength. 

In  the  quality  of  strength,  Macaulay  offers  a  great  and  obvious 
contrast  to  De  Quincey — the  contrast  between  brilliant  animation 
and  stately  pomp.  His  movement  is  more  rapid  and  less  dignified. 
He  does  not  slowly  evolve  his  periods,  "  as  under  some  genial  in- 
stinct of  incubation  : "  he  never  remits  his  efforts  to  dazzle ;  and 
in  his  most  swelling  cadences,  he  always  seems  to  be  perorating 
against  an  imaginary  antagonist. 

Most  of  the  elements  of  his  peculiar  animation  have  already 
been  noticed  in  other  connections.  We  have  already  commented 
upon  the  varied  expression,  the  abrupt  transitions,  the  constant 
play  of  antithesis,  the  perspicuous  nuthoi,  and  the  lively  arr.-iy 
of  concrete  particulars.  We  have  also  noticed  implicitly  the  ex- 
hilarating pace  both  of  the  language  and  of  the  thoughts,  the 
rapidity  of  the  rhythm — as  determined  by  shortness  of  phrase, 
clause,  and  sentence — and  the  quick  succession  of  the  ideas, 

As  regards  his  animated  "objectivity,"  or  concreteness,  there  is 
one  thing  that  might  be  brought  out  more  fully — namely,  his  art 
of  enlivening  condensed  narrative  by  pictorial,  or  at  least  concrete, 
circumlocutions.  We  quote  as  an  example  part  of  his  account  of 
Strafford  :— 

"  He  had  been  one  of  the  most  distinguished  members  of  the  Opposition, 
and  felt  towards  those  whom  he  had  deserted  that  peculiar  malignity  which 
has,  in  all  ages,  been  characteristic  of  apostates.  He  perfectly  understood  the 
feelings,  the  resources,  and  the  policy  of  the  party  to  which  he  had  lately 
belonged,  and  had  formed  a  vast  and  deeply  meditated  scheme  which  very 
nearly  confounded  even  the  able  tactics  of  the  statesmen  by  whom,  the  House  of 
Commons  had  been  directed.  ...  His  object  was  to  do  for  England  all, 


110  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAT. 

and  more  than  all,  that  Richelieu  was  doing  in  France  ;  to  make  Charles  a 
rnonarch  as  absolute  as  any  on  the  Continent,"  &c. 

These  frequent  allusions  to  actual  men  and  things  would  alone 
make  the  style  vivacious ;  the  rapid  succession  of  particulars  is  in 
itself  exhilarating. 

He  had  a  great  command  over  the  proper  vocabulary  of  strength. 
He  is  very  vehement  in  his  epithets.  Whole  pages  might  be  quoted 
that  contain  hardly  a  single  adjective  under  the  degree  of  enormous. 
One  of  his  favourite  themes  is  the  corruption  and  profligacy  of  the 
Eestoration  times.  Whenever  he  has  occasion  to  speak  of  this,  he 
seems  to  fall  into  a  passion,  and  uses  the  strongest  language  that 
propriety  will  allow.  And  this  subject  is  only  one  out  of  many 
that  provoke  his  vehemence  to  an  equal  degree.  On  every  sub- 
ject, indeed,  he  expresses  himself  with  confidence,  and  in  language 
habitually  bordering  on  the  extrema 

He  has  been  much  taken  to  task  for  the  violence  of  his  invective. 
Certainly,  when  he  conceived  a  dislike  to  an  individual  or  to  an 
institution,  he  expressed  his  feelings  without  reserve.  And  he 
disliked  a  great  many  characters.  He  disliked  all  the  English 
statesmen  of  the  Eevolution  period  for  their  treachery  and  want 
of  patriotism.  Sir  William  Temple  he  pronounces  to  be  "  the  most 
respectable  "  of  them.  Yet  even  Temple,  he  declares,  "  was  not  a 
man  to  his  taste";  he  "  had  not  sufficient  warmth  and  elevation  of 
sentiment  to  deserve  the  name  of  a  virtuous  man."  Judge  Jeffreys 
he  regards  with  the  most  absolute  loathing,  and  holds  up  to  con- 
tempt and  hatred  with  an  indignation  as  cordial  as  if  one  of  his 
own  family  had  been  among  the  bloody  monster's  many  victims. 
Concerning  this  part  of  the  History,  Mr  Croker  said  in  the  '  Quar- 
j  terly  Review"  tliat  the  historian  had  almost  realised  Alexander 
Chalmers's  '  Biographia  Flagitiosa ;  or,  the  Lives  of  Eminent 
Scoundrels.'  "  He  hates,"  said  Mr  Croker  further,  "  nearly  every- 
body but  Cromwell,  William,  Whig  exiles,  and  Dissenting  parsons." 
The  last  sneer  goes  perhaps  too  far ;  the  insinuation  is  hardly  cor- 
rect :  Macaulay  was  much  more  impartial  in  his  hatred  than  this 
would  imply.  He  hated  some  of  the  French  Republicans  as  heart- 
ily as  he  hated  any  of  our  English  ancestors,  whether  Whig  or 
Tory.  He  has  written  nothing  stronger  than  his  condemnation  of 
Barrera  Barrere  "  approached  nearer  than  any  person  mentioned 
in  history  or  fiction,  whether  man  or  devil,  to  the  idea  of  consum- 
mate and  universal  depravity."  This  is  very  strong,  but  becomes 
stronger  still  as  the  historian  proceeds.  Here  he  makes  Barrere 
an  approximation  to  unqualified  depravity :  a  little  further,  and 
he  drops  the  slight  reservation.  "  All  the  other  chiefs  of  parties 
had  some  good  qualities,  and  Barrere  had  none."  "  Barrere  had 
not  a  single  virtue,  nur  even  tlte  semblance  of  one." 

Sometimes,  in  his  contemptuous  and  derisive  moods,  he  uses  a 


STRENGTH.  Ill 

studied  meanness  of  expression  that  reminds  us  of  the  coarse 
familiarity  of  Swift.  Thus,  speaking  of  Boswell,  he  says — "  If  he 
had  not  been  a  great  fool,  he  would  never  have  been  a  great 
writer."  So  of  Chatham,  he  says — "He  was  not  invited  to  be- 
come a  placeman,  and  he  therefore  stuck  firmly  to  his  old  trade  of 
patriot."  This  homely  order  of  expression  he  often  employs  with 
great  effect  in  the  way  of  derisive  refutation.  Thus,  in  ridiculing 
Southey's  sentimental  views  on  questions  of  political  economy,  he 
says — "  We  might  ask  how  it  can  be  said  that  there  is  no  limit  to 
the  production  of  paper  money,  when  a  man  is  hanged  if  he  issues 
any  in  the  name  of  another,  and  is  forced  to  cash  what  he  issues  in 
his  own  ?" 

It  is  difficult  to  draw  the  line  between  such  strength  of  language 
and  the  figure  of  speech  known  as  hyperbola  The  italicised  ex- 
pressions in  the  following  passages  are  unmistakably  hyperbolical. 
Such  expressions  are  very  common  in  Macaulay,  and,  read  along 
with  the  context,  do  not  strike  us  as  rising  far  above  the  general 
level  of  his-  language  : — 

"  The  house  of  Bourbon  was  at  the  summit  of  human  greatness.  England 
had  been  outwitted,  and  found  herself  in  a  situation  at  once  degrading  and 
perilous.  The  people  of  France,  not  presaging  the  calamities  by  which  they 
were  destined  to  expiate  the  perfidy  of  their  sovereign,  went  mad  with  pride 
and  delight.  Ecery  man  looked  as  if  a  great  estate  hadj-ust  been  left  him." 

"  His  own  reflections,  his  own  energy,  were  to  supply  the  place  of  all 
Downing  Street  and  Somerset  House.  .  .  .  The  preservation  of  an  em- 
pire from  a  formidable  combination  of  foreign  enemies,  the  construction  of 
a  government  in  all  its  parts,  were  accomplished  by  him,  while  every  ship 
brought  out  bales  of  censure  from  his  employers,  and  while  the  records  of 
every  consultation  vr  ere  filled  with  acrimonious  minutes  by  colleagues." 

One  of  his  modes  of  exaggeration  is  almost  a  mannerism. 
Whatever  he  happens  to  be  engaged  with  is  in  some  respect  OP 
other  the  most  wonderful  thing  that  ever  existed.  The  following 
are  his  two  most  common  forms  for  expressing  such  a  conviction  : 
— (i.)  "  No  election  ever  took  place  under  circumstances  so  favour- 
able to  the  Court."  (2.)  "  Of  all  the  many  unpopular  steps  taken 
by  the  Government,  the  most  unpopular  was  the  publishing  of  this 
declaration." 

He  is  sometimes  betrayed  into  making  the  same  extreme  state- 
ment about  two  different  persons.  Thus  he  says  of  Clarendon — 
"  No  man  ever  laboured  so  hard  to  make  himself  despicable  and 
ludicrous ; "  and  it  is  notorious  that  he  makes  a  like  remark  about 
BoswelL 

So  much  for  the  animation  of  Macaulay's  manner.  As  regards 
his  choice  of  subjects,  it  may  be  said  in  general  that  he  is  careful 
to  take  up  only  such  as  have  an  independent  interest  to  the  mass 
of  English  readers.  Consequently  his  charms  of  style  operate  at 


112  THOMAS   BAB1NGTON   MACAULAY. 

every  advantage ;  they  have  no  dead  weight  to  overcome ;  they 
are  required  only  to  support  the  natural  interest  of  the  matter. 
A  History  of  England,  if  written  with  moderate  spirit,  would 
always  have  an  attraction  for  every  Englishman ;  written  with 
Macaulay's  glowing  patriotism  and  brilliant  style,  it  proved  more 
attractive  than  the  most  captivating  novel.  Similarly  with  hia 
Essays.  His  article  on  Milton  placed  him  at  once  in  the  first  rank 
of  popular  favourites;  an  extraordinary  success  resulting,  not  so 
much  from  the  display  of  his  literary  knowledge,  as  from  the 
happy  application  of  his  glittering  rhetoric  to  a  theme  much  can- 
vassed at  the  time.  All  his  essays  are  upon  men  of  first-rate  in- 
terest :  any  particulars  about  Machiavelli,  Byron,  Johnson,  Bacon, 
Pitt,  or  Frederick  the  Great,  are  eagerly  read,  if  there  is  any  appear- 
ance of  novelty  in  the  manner  of  relating  them. 

Great  men  and  great  events — these  are  the  favourite  themes  of 
Macaulay.  When  such  matter  is  handled  in  such  a  manner,  no 
wonder  that  the  writer  is  the  most  popular  author  of  his  day. 

Animation  is  our  author's  distinguishing  quality ;  but  often 
from  the  grandeur  of  his  subject,  and  of  the  objects  that  he  brings 
into  comparison  with  it  from  all  countries  and  from  all  times,  his 
style  takes  a  loftier  tone. 

There  is  something  more  than  animating  in  his  easy  manner  of 
ranging  through  space  and  time.  To  be  transported  with  such 
freedom  from  continent  to  continent,  from  dynasty  to  dynasty, 
and  from  age  to  age  ;  to  pass  judgment  on  the  rival  pretensions  of 
the  foremost  men  and  the  most  august  empires  that  have  appeared 
in  the  world, — this,  unless  we  have  a  very  frivolous  conception  of 
what  we  are  doing,  should  elevate  us  to  the  highest  heights  of 
sublimity.  Macaulay's  abrupt  manner  is  sometimes  antagonistic 
to  the  finest  effects  that  might  be  accomplished  by  these  ambitious 
surveys.  But  very  often  his  eloquence  is  lofty  and  imposing. 

Thus,  in  advocating  with  wonted  enthusiasm  the  apotheosis  of 
Lord  Olive  : — 

"  From  Olive's  second  visit  to  India  dates  the  political  ascendancy  of  the 
English  in  that  country.  His  dexterity  and  resolution  realised,  in  the 
course  of  a  few  months,  more  than  all  the  gorgeous  visions  which  had  floated 
before  the  imagination  of  Dupleix.  Such  an  extent  of  cultivated  territory, 
such  an  amount  of  revenue,  such  a  multitude  of  subjects,  was  never  added 
to  the  dominion  of  Rome  by  the  most  successful  proconsul.  Nor  were  such 
wealthy  spoils  ever  borne  under  arches  of  triumph,  down  the  Sacred  Way, 
and  through  the  crowded  Forum,  to  the  threshold  of  Tarpeian  Jove.  The 
fame  of  those  who  subdued  Antiochus  and  Tigranes  grows  dim  when  com- 
pared  witli  the  splendour  of  the  exploits  which  the  young  English  adven- 
turer achieved  at  the  head  of  an  army  not  equal  in  numbers  to  one  hali  ol  a 
Roman  legion." 

Perhaps   his  noblest  flight  of   sublimity  is  his  eulogy  of   the 


PATIIOS.  113 

Roman  Catholic  Government  This  is  in  every  way  an  admirable 
specimen  of  his  style.  There  is  just  one  break  in  the  sustained 
grandeur  of  the  passage.  He  should  not  have  introduced  the  nu- 
merical comparison  between  the  different  creeds — a  tag  of  statistics 
is  very  chilling  and  repulsive  amidst  the  glowing  flow  of  admi- 
ration. Macaulay's  abundance  of  hard  information  often  betrays 
him  into  violations  of  Art 

Pathos. 

In  Macaulay's  style,  as  in  his  nature,  there  was  more  vigour 
than  tenderness  or  delicacy.  The  abruptness  and  rapidity  of  tran- 
sition, and  the  unseasonable  intrusion  of  hard  matters  of  fact,  which 
we  have  just  referred  to  as  being  fatal  to  sustained  sublimity,  were 
no  less  fatal  to  sustained  pathos.  The  following  account  of  the 
death  of  Hampden  illustrates  the  beauties  and  the  faults  of  his 
pathetic  narration : — 

"Hampden,  with  his  head  drooping,  and  his  hands  leaning  on  his  horse's 
neck,  moved  feebly  out  of  the  battle.  The  mansion  which  had  been  in- 
habited by  his  father-in-law,  and  from  which  in  his  youth  he  had  carried 
home  his  bride  Elizabeth,  was  in  sight  There  still  remains  an  affecting 
tradition  that  he  looked  for  a  moment  towards  that  beloved  house,  and  made 
an  effort  to  go  thither  to  die.  But  the  enemy  lay  in  that  direction.  He 
turned  his  horse  towards  Thame,  where  he  arrived  almost  fainting  with 
agony.  The  surgeons  dressed  his  wounds.  But  there  was  no  hope.  The 
pain  which  he  suffered  was  most  excruciating.  But  he  endured  it  with 
admirable  firmness  and  resignation.  His  first  care  was  for  his  country.  He 
wrote  from  his  bed  several  letters  to  London  concerning  public  affairs,  and 
sent  a  last  pressing  message  to  the  headquarters,  recommending  that  the 
dispersed  forces  should  be  concentrated.  AVhen  his  public  duties  were  per- 
formed, he  calmly  prepared  himself  to  die.  He  was  attended  by  a  clergy- 
man of  the  Church  of  England,  with  whom  he  had  lived  in  habits  of 
intimacy,  and  by  the  chaplain  of  the  Buckinghamshire  Green-coats,  Dr 
Spurton,  whom  Baxter  describes  as  a  famous  and  excellent  divine." 

The  galloping  short  sentences  in  the  middle  of  the  passage  are 
sadly  out  of  harmony  with  the  occasion,  and  nothing  could  be 
more  uncongenial  than  the  ostentatious  scrap  of  antiquarian  know- 
ledge foisted  in  at  the  end. 

His  reflections  on  St  Peter's  Ad  Vincula,  where  Monmouth  was 
buried,  are  solemn  and  touching.  He  warns  us  that — 

"  Death  is  there  associated,  not,  as  in  Westminster  Abbey  and  St  Paul's, 
with  genius  and  virtue,  with  public  veneration,  and  with  imperishable 
renown  ;  not,  as  in  our  humblest  churches  and  churchyards,  with  everything 
that  is  most  endearing  in  social  and  domestic  charities, — but  with  whatever 
is  darkest  in  human  nature  and  in  human  destiny,  with  the  savage  triumph 
of  implacable  enemies,  with  the  inconstancy,  the  ingratitude,  the  cowardice 
of  friends,  with  all  the  miseries  of  fallen  greatness  and  of  blighted  fame,"— 

and  he  then  proceeds  to  record  a  long  line  of  illustrious  and  un- 
fortunate dead.  The  art  of  such  a  passage  is  of  the  simplest 

H 


114          THOMAS  BABINGTON  MACAULAY. 

order.  To  us  it  is  affecting  as  a  vivid  representation  of  the  lapse 
of  time,  and  of  the  disasters  that  wait  upon  greatness  :  but  to  the 
narrator  it  is  little  more  than  an  exercise  of  historical  memory. 

The  Ludicrous. 

Macaulay's  wit  and  humour  are  the  wit  and  humour  usually 
ascribed  to  "  The  True-Born  Englishman."  He  has  no  command 
either  of  biting  insinuation  or  of  delicate  raillery.  His  laugh  is 
hearty  and  confident ;  unsparing  contempt,  open  derision,  broad 
and  boisterous  humour.  Of  each  of  the  three  qualities  thus 
loosely  expressed,  we  shall  produce  examples :  his  portrait  of 
Archbishop  Laud,  for  whom  he  "  entertained  a  more  unmitigated 
contempt  than  for  any  character  in  our  history ;"  a  short  extract 
from  his  review  of  Mitford's  'History  of  Greece';  and  the  begin- 
ning of  his  review  of  Nares's  '  Life  of  Lord  Burleigh ' : — 

"  Bad  as  the  Archbishop  was,  however,  he  was  not  a  traitor  within  the 
statute.  Nor  wns  he  by  any  means  so  formidable  as  to  be  a  proper  subject 
for  a  retrospective  ordinance  of  the  Legislature.  His  mind  had  not  expan- 
sion enough  to  comprehend  a  great  scheme,  good  or  bad.  His  oppressive 
acts  were  not,  like  those  of  the  Earl  of  Strafford,  parts  of  an  extensive  sys- 
tem. They  were  the  luxuries  in  which  a  mean  and  irritable  disposition 
indulges  itself  from  day  to  day,  the  excesses  natural  to  a  little  mind  in  a 
great  place.  The  severest  punishment  which  the  two  Houses  could  have 
inflicted  on  him  would  have  been  to  set  him  at  liberty,  and  send  him  to 
Oxford.  There  he  might  have  stayed,  tortured  by  his  own  diabolical 
temper — hungering  for  Puritans  to  pillory  and  mangle;  plaguing  the 
Cavaliers,  for  want  of  somebody  else  to  plague,  with  his  peevishness  and 
absurdity  ;  performing  grimaces  and  antics  in  the  Cathedral ;  continuing 
that  incomparable  Diary,  which  we  never  see  without  forgetting  the  vices 
of  his  heart  in  the  imbecility  of  his  intellect,  minuting  down  his  dreams, 
counting  the  drops  of  blood  which  fell  from  his  nose,  watching  the  direction 
of  the  salt,  and  listening  for  the  note  of  the  screech-owls.  Contemptuous 
mercy  was  the  only  vengeance  which  it  became  the  Parliament  to  take  on 
such  a  ridiculous  old  bigot." 

"  The  principal  characteristic  of  this  historian,  the  origin  of  his  excellences 
and  his  defects,  is  a  love  of  singularity.  He  has  no  notion  of  going  with  a 
multitude  to  do  either  good  or  evil.  An  exploded  opinion,  or  an  unpopular 
person,  has  an  irresistible  charm  for  him.  The  same  perverseness  may  be 
traced  in  his  diction.  His  style  would  never  have  been  elegant,  but  it  might 
at  least  have  been  manly  and  perspicuous  ;  and  nothing  but  the  most  elabor- 
ate care  could  possibly  have  made  it  so  bad  as  it  is." 

"The  work  of  Dr  Nares  has  filled  us  with  astonishment  similar  to  that 
which  Captain  Lemuel  Gulliver  felt  when  first  he  landed  in  Brobdingnag, 
and  saw  corn  as  high  as  the  oaks  in  the  New  Forest,  thimbles  as  large  as 
buckets,  and  wrens  of  the  bulk  of  turkeys.  The  whole  book,  and  every 
component  part  of  it,  is  on  a  gigantic  scale.  The  title  is  as  long  as  an 
ordinary  preface  ;  the  prefatory  matter  would  furnish  out  an  ordinary 
bo.)k ;  and  the  book  contains  as  much  reading  as  an  ordinary  library.  We 
cannot  sum  up  the  merits  of  the  stupendous  miss  of  paper  which  lies  before 
us  better  than  by  saying  that  it  consists  of  about  two  thousand  closely 


MELODY,   HAEMONY,  TASTE — DESCKIPTION.  115 

printed  quarto  pages,  that  it  occupies  fifteen  hundred  inches  cubic  measure, 
and  that  it  weighs  sixty  pounds  avoirdupois.  Such  a  book  might,  before 
the  deluge,  have  been  considered  as  light  reading  by  Hilpa  and  Shalum. 
But,  unhappily,  the  life  of  man  is  now  threescore  years  and  ten  ;  and  we 
cannot  but  think  it  somewhat  unfair  in  Dr  Nares  to  demand  from  us  so 
large  a  portion  of  so  short  an  existence. 

"Compared  with  the  labour  of  reading  through  these  volumes,  nil  other 
labour,  the  labour  of  thieves  on  the  treadmill,  of  children  in  factories,  of 
negroes  in  sugar-plantations,  is  an  agreeable  recreation,"  &c. 

His  masterpieces  of  broad  ridicule  are  found  in  his  literary 
reviews.  He  makes  unmerciful  game  of  Southey's  Political 
Economy,  Robert  Montgomery's  Poems,  and  Croker's  edition  of 
BoswelL 

Melody,  Harmony,  Taste. 

Macaulay's  rhythm  is  fluent,  rarely  obstructed  by  harsh  combina- 
tions, but  it  is  not  rich  and  musical  like  De  Quincey's.  Though 
often  abrupt  and  always  rapid,  at  times,  as  we  Lave  seen,  it  swells 
into  more  flowing  cadences ;  yet,  at  best,  the  melody  of  his  sen- 
tences is  the  melody  of  a  fluent  and  rapid  speaker,  not  the  musical 
roll  of  a  writer  whose  ear  takes  engrossing  delight  in  the  luxuries 
of  sound. 

Beyond  amplifying  the  roll  of  his  sentences  when  he  rose  to 
more  stately  declamations,  he  does  not  appear  to  have  studied 
much  the  adaptation  of  sound  to  sense.  His  rhythm  is  well 
suited  to  the  general  vigour  of  his  purposes ;  it  is  not  much  in 
harmony  with  quiet  and  delicate  touches. 

Like  De  Quincey  and  Carlyle,  he  has  certain  salient  manner- 
isms. The  general  voice  of  persons  of  cultivated  taste  is  against 
his  abruptness,  his  hyperbolical  turn  of  expression,  and  his  need- 
less employment  of  antithesis.  In  these  particulars  he  has  trans- 
gressed the  general  rule  of  not  carrying  pungent  and  striking 
artifices  to  excess.  Objection  may  also  be  taken  to  the  unmiti- 
gated force  of  his  derision  and  his  humour.  "  There  is  too  much 
horse-play  in  his  raillery." 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Description. 

In  one  of  his  earlier  essays,  Macaulay  lays  down  the  opinion 
that  mere  descriptions  of  scenery  are  tiresome,  and  that  still  life 
needs  associations  with  human  feeling  to  make  it  interesting- 
This  explains  why  his  writings  contain  so  few  descriptions  of 
natural  scenery. 

When  engaged  on  his  History  he  made  it  a  point  of  conscience  to 
visit  and  describe  from  personal  observation  the  scenes  of  the  most 
memorable  events.  He  visited  the  battle-field  of  Sedgmoor,  and 


116  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

describes  the  general  appearance  of  the  country  at  the  present  day 
as  seen  from  the  church-tower  of  Bridgewater.  But  the  description 
is  rather  an  analysis  of  the  landscape  into  its  general  elements, 
mingled  with  various  historical  reminiscences,  than  a  composition 
of  those  elements  into  a  definite  picture.  In  like  manner  he  wrote 
on  the  spot  a  description  of  the  Irish  towns  round  which  the 
Englishry  rallied  at  the  Revolution — Kenmare,  Enniskillen,  and 
Londonderry.  In  describing  Kenmare,  he  simply  notes  the  gen- 
eral features  of  the  district — "  the  mountains,  the  glens,  the  capea 
stretching  far  into  the  Atlantic,  the  crags  on  which  the  eagles 
build,  the  rivulets  brawling  down  rocky  passes,  the  lakes  over- 
hung by  groves,  in  which  the  wild  deer  find  covert ; "  elements, 
certainly,  of  gorgeous  scenery,  but  left  to  the  reader  to  form  into 
a  coherent  landscape.  His  description  of  Londonderry  is  perhaps 
his  most  vivid  effort.  Yet  even  this  is  vague  compared  with  the 
luminous  word-painting  of  Carlyle. 

In  his  Essays  he  neglects  many  opportunities  that  a  master  of 
descriptive  art  would  have  eagerly  seized.  Had  Carlyle  written 
an  essay  on  Lord  Clive,  he  would  have  luxuriated  in  realising  to 
English  readers  the  novel  aspects  of  Indian  scenery;  he  would  have 
put  forth  alTliis  powers  of  imagery  to  convey  a  distinct  impression 
of  the  shape  and  dimensions  of  the  table-lands  and  the  great  valleys, 
and  would  have  placed  vividly  before  us  the  exact  "  lie  "  of  the 
hill-fortresses  and  the  magnificent  cities  of  the  "plains,  the  appear- 
ance of  the  surrounding  country,  and,  as  far  as  language  can  express 
such  things,  even  the  variations  of  sky  and  atmosphere. 

But  is  not  Macaulay  always  spoken  of  as  a  great  pictorial  artist  ? 
True,  he  is  so ;  but  in  a  very  different  sense  from  such  artists  as 
Carlyle.  The  dictum  quoted  above  is  the  key  to  his  choice  of 
subjects.  What  he  delights  to  group  and  to  delineate  is  not 
inanimate  things,  but  the  condition,  actions,  and  productions  of 
man.  When  he  describes  a  town  he  is  concerned  less  with  its 
shape  and  its  position  relatively  to  the  surrounding  landscape, 
than  with  its  political  or  commercial  importance,  the  number  and 
character  of  its  population,  or  the  splendour  of  its  buildings.  The 
description  of  Benares  is  a  fair  specimen  of  his  manner : — 

"  His  first  design  was  on  Benares,  a  city  which  in  wealth,  population, 
dignity,  and  sanctity,  was  among  the  foremost  of  Asia.  It  was  commonly 
believed  tliat  half  a  million  of  human  beings  was  crowded  into  that  labyrinth 
of  lofty  alleys,  rich  with  shrines,  and  minarets,  and  balconies,  and  carved 
oriels  to  which  the  sacred  apes  clung  by  hundreds.  The  traveller  could 
scarce  make  his  way  through  the  press  of  holy  mendicants,  and  not  less 
holy  bulls.  The  broad  and  stately  nights  of  steps  which  descended  from 
these  ewnrming  haunts  to  the  bathing-places  along  the  Ganges,  were  worn 
every  day  by  the  footsteps  of  an  innumerable  multitude  of  worshippers.  The 
schools  and  temples  drew  crowds  of  pious  Hindoos  from  every  province  where 
the  Bralnniuical  faith  was  known.  .  .  .  Commerce  had  as  many  pilgrims 


DESCRIPTION.  117 

ns  religion.  All  along  the  shores  of  the  venerable  stream  lay  great  fleets  of 
vessels  laden  with  rich  merchandise.  From  the  looms  of  Benares  went  forth 
the  most  delicate  silks  that  adorned  the  balls  of  St  James's  and  of  the  Petit 
Trianon  ;  and  in  the  bazaars  the  muslins  of  Bengal  and  the  sabres  of  Oude 
were  mingled  with  the  jewels  of  Golcouda  and  the  shawls  of  Cashmere." 

There  is  thus  no  lack  of  pictorial  matter  in  Macaulay.  The 
peculiarity  is,  that  so  much  of  it  has  a  direct  connection  with 
human  beings,  and  that  though  of  a  strongly  objective  turn  of 
mind,  he  had  no  natural  bent  for  the  description  of  still  life.  It 
was  vigorous,  stirring  movejnent — "  the  rush  and  the  roar  of  prac- 
tical life  " — that  chiefly  engaged  his  interest  He  is  nowhere  more 
in  his  element  than  in  describing  a  gorgeous  pageant,  or  the  de- 
monstrations of  an  excited  mob.  He  enters  with  great  zest  into 
the  reception  of  Charles  I.  at  Norwich,  the  "  Progress  "  of  James 
II.,  the  procession  of  William  and  Mary  along  the  Strand,  the 
ceremony  of  the  coronation,  and  suchlike.  He  describes  the 
accompanying  festivities  with  gusto ;  the  illuminations,  the  bells 
ringing,  the  "  conduits  spouting  wine,"  the  "  gutters  running  with 
ale."  There  is  probably  no  prose  passage  that  has  been  oftener 
committed  to  memory  than  his  account  of  the  trial  of  Hastings. 
One  of  his  most  vivid  pictures  is  his  detail  of  the  prolonged  excite- 
ment of  London  during  the  persecution  and  trial  of  the  seven 
Bishops,  and  the  burst  of  joy  upon  their  acquittal: — 

"Sir  Roger  Langley  answered  'Not  guilty  I'  As  the  words  passed  his 
lips,  Halifax  sprang  up  and  waved  his  hat.  At  that  signal,  benches  and 
galleries  raised  a  shout.  In  a  moment  ten  thousand  persons,  who  crowded 
the  great  hall,  replied  with  a  still  louder  shout,  which  made  the  old  oaken 
roof  crack ;  and  in  another  moment  the  innumerable  throng  without  set  up 
a  third  huzza,  which  was  heard  at  Temple  Bar.  The  boats  which  covered 
the  Thames  gave  an  answering  cheer.  A  peal  of  gunpowder  was  heard  on 
the  water,  and  another,  and  another ;  and  so,  in  a  few  moments  the  glad 
tilings  were  flying  past  the  Savoy  and  the  Friars  to  London  Bridge,  and  to 
the  forest  of  masts  below.  As  the  news  spread,  streets  and  squares,  market- 
places and  coffee-houses,  broke  forth  into  acclamations.  Yet  were  the 
acclamations  less  strange  than  the  weeping.  For  the  feelings  of  men  had 
been  wound  up  to  such  a  point,  that  at  length  the  stern  English  nature,  so 
little  used  to  outward  signs  of  emotion,  gave  way,  and  thousands  sobbed 
aloud  for  very  joy.  Meanwhile,  from  the  outskirts  of  the  multitude,  horse- 
men were  spurring  off  to  bear  along  all  the  great  roads  intelligence  of  the  vic- 
tory of  our  Church  and  nation, " 

As  regards  the  method  of  such  descriptions.  They  follow  very 
much  the  same  rules  as  the  description  of  scenery.  The  describer 
should  begin  with  a  comprehensive  view  of  his  subject  In  this 
respect  Macaulay  is,  as  a  rule,  exemplary.  In  his  description  of 
Benares,  for  instance,  the  first  sentence  is  a  summary  introduction 
to  what  follows.  Further,  the  describer  should  observe  a  method 
in  the  details ;  he  should  place  together  all  that  are  connected,  and 
should  give  them  either  in  the  direct  or  in  the  inverse  order  of 


118  THOMAS    BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

importance  :  he  should,  at  least,  consider  what  is  the  most  lumin- 
ous method  in  the  particular  case.  This  Macaulay  is  not  sufficiently 
careful  to  do :  we  saw  (p.  95)  that  his  order  of  statement  is  some- 
times confused.  The  description  of  the  London  rejoicings  is  of 
the  nature  of  a  description  from  the  traveller's  point  of  view. 

After  all,  the  objective  character  of  our  author's  style  consists 
more  in  the  pictorial  touches  brought  in  by  a  side  wind  than  in 
the  direct  description  of  objects.  We  have  already  seen,  that 
instead  of  making  a  plain  statement  of  fact,  he  states  some  sug- 
gestive circumstance.  Instead  of  saying  that  nobles  and  even 
princes  were  proud  of  a  University  degree,  he  says  that  they 
"  were  proud  to  receive  from  a  University  the  privilege  of  wearing 
tJte  doctoral  scarlet."  Instead  of  saying  that  the  Dutch  would 
never  incur  the  risk  of  an  invasion,  he  says  that  "they  would 
never  incur  the  risk  of  seeing  an  invading  army  encamped  between 
Utrecht  and  Amsterdam"  Such  concrete  circumstances  are  very 
instrumental  in  keeping  up  the  pictorial  air  of  his  pages — impart- 
ing all  the  more  splendour  that,  as  a  rule,  they  are  loud  and  glar- 
ing, rather  than  quiet  and  significant 

In  the  important  process  of  describing  the  feelings,  he  displays 
his  usual  objectivity.  He  tells  what  people  said,  what  they  did, 
how  they  looked,  what  visions  passed  through  their  imaginations, 
and  leaves  the  particularities  of  their  state  of  feeling  to  be  inferred 
from  these  material  indications.  Carlyle  represents  Johnson  "with 
his  great  greedy  heart  and  unspeakable  chaos  of  thoughts ;  stalk- 
ing mournful  on  this  e  irth,  eagerly  devouring  what  spiritual  thing 
he  could  come  at."  Macaulay  represents  him  with  more  of  concrete 
circumstances :  "  ransacking  his  father's  shelves,"  "  devouring 
hundreds  of  pnges,"  "treating  the  academical  authorities  with 
gross  disrespect,"  standing  "  under  the  gate  of  Pembroke,  haran- 
guing a  circle  of  lads,  over  whom,  in  spite  of  his  tattered  gown 
and  dirty  linen,  his  wit  and  audacity  gave  him  an  undisputed 
ascendancy." 

Narrative. 

Whatever  be  the  ultimate  judgment  of  able  critics  regarding  the 
merits  of  Macaulay's  '  History  of  England,'  viewed  as  a  philoso- 
phical history  or  as  a  solid  narrative  of  public  events,  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  it  was  and  is  an  eminently  popular  work.  It 
gained  the  popular  favour  not  by  slow  degrees,  but  at  a  leap ;  five 
editions,  numbering  in  all  about  18,000  copies,  were  sold  in  six 
months.  In  the  following  remarks,  we  cannot  profess  to  analyse 
all  the  ingredients  of  his  extraordinary  charm  for  English  readers, 
but  only  to  observe  how  far  he  fulfils  certain  conditions  of  per- 
spicuous, instructive,  and  interesting  narrative. 


NAERATIVE.  119 

The  affairs  of  England  during  the  reigns  of  James  and  William 
were  considerably  involved,  and  without  skilful  arrangement  a  his- 
tory of  that  period  could  hardly  fail  to  be  confused.  Macaulay's 
exhibition  of  the  movements  of  diffeient  parties,  the  different 
aspects  of  things  in  the  three  parts  of  the  kingdom,  the  compli- 
cated relations  between  James  and  William,  and  the  intrigues  ol 
different  individuals,  is  managed  with  great  perspicuity. 

He  is  exemplary  in  keeping  prominent  the  main  action  and  tho 
main  actor.  After  the  death  of  Charles,  our  interest  centres  in 
James.  We  are  eager  to  know  how  the  change  of  monarch  was 
received  in  London  and  through  the  country,  and  how  James 
stood  in  his  relations  with  France  and  Rome,  with  Scotland,  and 
with  the  English  clergy  and  the  Dissenters.  Macaulay  follows  the 
lead  of  this  natural  interest,  and  does  not  leave  James  until  he  is 
fairly  settled  on  the  throne.  James  once  established,  our  interest 
in  him  is  for  the  time  satisfied,  and  we  desire  to  know  the  pro- 
ceedings of  his  baffled  opponents.  Accordingly,  the  historian 
transports  us  to  the  asylum  of  the  Whig  refugees  on  the  Continent, 
describes  them,  and  keeps  their  machinations  in  Holland,  and  their 
successive  invasions  of  Britain,  prominent  on  the  stage  until  the 
final  collapse  of  their  designs  and  the  execution  of  their  leaders. 
That  chapter  of  the  History  ends  with  an  account  of  the  cruelties 
perpetrated  on  the  aiders  and  abettors  of  the  western  insurrection 
under  Monmouth.  Then  the  scene  changes  to  Ireland,  the  next 
interesting  theatre  of  events.  And  so  on  :  there  were  various 
critical  junctures  in  the  history  of  the  Government,  and  the  events 
leading  to  each  are  traced  separately. 

The  arrangement  is  so  easy  and  natural,  that  one  almost  won- 
ders to  see  it  alleged  as  a  merit.  But  when  we  compare  it  \\ith 
Hume's  arrangement  of  the  events  of  the  same  period,  we  see  that 
even  a  historian  of  eminence  may  pursue  a  less  luminous  method. 
Hume  relates,  first,  all  that  in  his  time  was  known  of  James's 
relations  with  France;  then  the  various  particulars  of  his  adminis- 
tration in  England,  down  to  the  insurrection  of  Monmouth  ;  then 
the  state  of  affairs  in  Scotland,  including  Argyle's  invasion  and  the 
conduct  of  the  Parliament.  He  goes  upon  the  plan  of  taking  up 
events  in  local  departments,  violating  both  the  order  of  time  and 
the  order  of  dependence.  Macaulay  makes  the  government  of 
James  the  connecting  rod  or  trunk,  taking  up,  one  after  another, 
the  difficulties  that  successively  besiege  it,  and,  when  necessary, 
stepping  back  to  trace  the  particular  difficulty  on  hand  to  its  ori- 
ginal, without  regard  to  locality.  By  grappling  thus  boldly  with 
the  complicacy  of  events,  he  renders  his  narrative  more  continuous, 
and  avoids  the  error  of  making  a  wide  separation  between  events 
that  were  closely  connected  or  interdependent.  He  does  not,  like 
Hume,  give  the  descent  of  Monmouth  in  one  section,  and  the 


120  THOMAS  BABINGTON  MACAULAY. 

descent  of  Argyle  upon  Scotland,  an  event  prior  in  point  of  time, 
in  another  and  subsequent  section.  James,  after  his  accession,  put 
off  the  meeting  of  the  English  Parliament  till  the  inure  obsequious 
Parliament  of  Scotland  should  set  a  good  example.  Macaulay 
tells  us  at  once  James's  motive  for  delaying  the  meeting  of  the 
English  Parliament,  and  details  what  happened  in  Scotland  during 
the  fortnight  of  delay.  In  Hume's  History,  we  do  not  hear  of  the 
proceedings  instituted  by  the  Scottish  Parliament  till  after  the 
execution  of  Argyle,  by  which  time  we  are  interested  in  another 
chain  of  events,  and  do  not  catch  the  influence  of  the  proceedings 
in  Scotland  upon  the  proceedings  in  England. 

In  the  explanation  of  events,  Macaulay  is  simple,  perspicuous, 
and  plausible,  but  does  not  strike  us  as  being  precisely  correct. 
When  he  can  produce  a  broad  and  obvious  motive,  he  does  not 
refine  upon  the  proportionate  influence  of  minor  motives.  Upon 
this  tendency  we  remarked  in  treating  of  the  intellectual  qualities 
of  his  style.  If  it  does  not  add  to  his  scientific  value,  it  adds  at 
least  to  his  popularity. 

As  compared  with  the  historians  of  last  century — Hume,  Gibbon, 
Robertson — Macaulay  is  superior  in  the  use  of  summaries,  pro- 
spective and  retrospective,  to  help  our  comprehension  of  details. 
As  compared  with  Carlyle,  he  is  inferior  in  this  respect.  Before 
entering  into  the  detail  of  an  incident,  he  usually  favours  us  with 
a  general  sketch  of  its  nature,  and  its  bearing  on  what  has  been 
or  what  is  about  to  be  related ;  but  he  is  not  so  exemplary  in  pre- 
figuring the  course  of  events  on  the  larger  scale.  You  can  usually 
tell  from  the  beginning  of  a  paragraph  the  general  substance  of 
what  is  to  follow ;  you  cannot  always  tell  from  the  beginning  of  a 
chapter  what  may  be  the  nature  of  its  contents. 

The  interest  excited  by  the  '  History  of  England '  on  its  first 
appearance  was  doubtless  due  partly  to  its  controversial  tone,  and 
its  able  support  of  a  popular  side.  With  his  hatred  of  abstract 
principles  of  government,  it  was  not  to  be  supposed  that  he  would 
shape  his  narrative  with  a  view  to  drawing  from  the  facts  any 
general  political  lessons,  such  as  a  caution  against  the  evils  of 
arbitrary  government.  What  he  wished  to  enforce  was  not  an 
abstract  lesson,  but  a  strongly  cherished  opinion  amounting  briefly 
to  this,  that  the  government  of  the  Stuarts  was  a  curse  to  the 
country,  and  that  the  Revolution  was  a  blessing. 

The  History  has  been  wittily  called  "  The  Whig  Evangel,"  and 
we  have  seen  it  described  as  "An  Epic  Poem,  of  which  King 
William  is  the  Hero."  To  the  one  title  it  may  be  objected  that 
our  author  shows  the  Whig  statesmen  of  the  Revolution  to  have 
been  quite  as  discreditable  as  the  Tory  statesmen  ;  and  to  the 
other,  that  the  work  is  more  rhetorical  and  polemic  than  poetical 


NARRATIVE.  121 

If  we  must  have  a  caricature  secondary  title  for  the  book,  it  would 
perhaps  be  more  accurately  described  as  "  A  Plea  for  the  Glorious 
Memory,"  or  "A  short  and  easy  Method  with  the  Stuarts." 

One  of  Macaulay's  pet  theories,  advocated  with  his  usual  en- 
thusiasm, was  his  view  as  to  the  proper  method  of  writing  history. 
He  was  eager  for  the  admission  of  greater  scenical  interest.  He 
loses  no  opportunity  of  striking  at  "  the  dignity  of  history,"  which 
would  confine  the  historian  to  "  a  detail  of  public  occurrences — the 
operations  of  sieges — the  changes  of  administrations — the  treaties 
— the  conspiracies — the  rebellions."  He  would  "intersperse  the 
details  which  are  the  charm  of  historical  romances."  "The  per- 
fect historian  is  he  in  whose  work  the  character  and  spirit  of  an 
age  is  exhibited  in  miniature."  "  We  should  not  have  to  look  for 
the  wars  and  votes  of  the  Puritans  in  Clarendon,  and  for  their 
phraseology  in  '  Old  Mortality ' ;  for  one  half  of  King  James  in 
Hume,  and  for  the  other  half  in  the  '  Fortunes  of  Nigel.'  " 

Following  out  this  theory,  he  gives  to  his  work  a  strong  tincture 
of  personal  interest.  Even  in  the  introductory  summary,  when 
briefly  sketching  the  Commonwealth  and  the  Restoration,  he  does 
not  forget  his  ideal;  he  brings  up  the  "great  characteristics  of  the 
age,  the  loyal  enthusiasm  of  the  brave  English  gentry,  the  fierce 
licentiousness  of  the  swearing,  dicing,  drunken  reprobates,  whose 
excesses  disgraced  the  royal  cause — the  austerity  of  the  Presby- 
terian Sabbaths  in  the  city,  the  extravagance  of  the  Independent 
preachers  in  the  camp,  the  precise  garb,  the  severe  countenance,  the 
petty  scruples,  the  affected  accent,  the  absurd  names  and  phrases 
which  marked  the  Puritans," — and  so  on.  When  he  enters  on  the 
reign  of  James  IL  he  turns  aside  much  more  from  public  transac- 
tions to  the  details  of  private  life.  He  resuscitates  all  the  Court 
gossip  of  the  period.  He  draws  the  character  of  every  courtier  of 
any  note — rakes  up  their  foibles,  repeats  their  choicest  strokes  of 
wit  He  read  thousands  of  forgotten  tracts,  sermons,  and  satires 
in  order  to  revive  for  us  the  personalities  of  the  age.  He  devotes 
fifteen  pages  to  the  last  illness  and  death  of  Charles  II.,  and  forty 
to  the  persecution  and  trial  of  the  Seven  Bishops. 

It  may  well  be  asked  whether  with  all  this  infusion  of  personal 
interest  he  comes  near  his  ideal  of  presenting  a  miniature  of  the 
age.  If  any  one  had  objected  to  him  that  he  shows  us  the  life  of 
the  courtiers  and  the  clergy  rather  than  the  life  of  the  people,  he 
would  probably  have  pointed  to  the  passage  in  his  History  where 
he  despatches  all  that  he  has  to  say  about  the  people  in  six  pages, 
with  the  remark  that  so  little  is  known  concerning  "those  who 
held  the  ploughs,  who  tended  the  oxen,  who  toiled  at  the  looms  of 
Norwich,  and  squared  the  Portland  stone  for  St  Paul's." 

The  interest  of  personality  is  not  the  only  interest  in  his  nar- 


122  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

rative.  He  has  a  natural  tendency  to  give  it  a  dramatic  turn. 
When  he  introduces  his  personages,  and  explains  what  part  they 
are  playing,  he  drops  a  hint  that  by-and-by  they  may  be  found 
playing  a  very  different  part.  We  have  already  seen  how  invet- 
erate is  his  habit  of  deferring  an  event  till  he  has  told  us  what 
ought  to  have  happened  or  what  might  have  happened.  This 
bears  a  strong  resemblance  to  dramatic  plotting,  and  excites  very 
much  the  same  interest ;  it  is  one  of  the  best  recognised  means  of 
raising  expectation  and  keeping  it  in  suspense.  In  like  manner  he 
expatiates  on  all  the  preliminaries  of  an  action  till  he  has  awakened 
in  us  something  like  the  excitement  of  those  that  are  watching 
and  waiting  for  the  event 

Another  great  charm  in  Macaulay's  narrative  is  his  hopeful  tone, 
his  hearty  sympathy  with  progress,  and  confident  belief  in  the 
fact.  He  has  no  faith  in  the  dogma  that  former  times  were  better 
than  the  present ;  he  maintains  with  great  variety  of  eloquence  that 
mankind  is  steadily  and  rapidly  moving  forward.  Sanguine  minds 
are  never  weary  of  quoting  the  triumphal  opening  of  his  History, 
and  in  particular  his  unhesitating  declaration  that  "  the  history 
of  our  country  during  the  last  hundred  and  sixty  years  is  eminently 
the  history  of  physical,  of  moral,  and  of  intellectual  improvement." 

For  English  readers  this  charm  is  increased  by  the  historian's 
patriotism.  The  world  is  advancing,  and  England  is  walking  in 
the  van. 

Tlvs  "  celebrated  Third  Chapter.1' — This  chapter  professes  to  give 
a  picture  of  the  social  condition  of  "  the  England  which  Charles  II. 
governed."  It  is  interesting  as  an  elaborate  attempt  to  delineate 
a  cross  section  of  history. 

Many  of  the  details  have  been  challenged.  He  has  been 
accused  of  colouring  facts  to  suit  his  prejudice  in  favour  of 
modern  cultivation,  and  to  gratify  his  favourite  passion  for  an- 
tithesis. His  accounts  of  the  country  squire  and  the  country 
clergyman,  of  Buxton,  of  the  suburbs  of  London,  and  of  one  or 
two  other  things,  are  said  to  be  greatly  exaggerated.  He  ia 
charged  with  taking  the  lampoons  of  the  time  as  documents  of 
literal  fidelity. 

Without  pronouncing  upon  the  merits  of  these  charges,  which 
the  historian's  defenders  declare  to  be  trivial,  we  may  enter  two 
objections  to  the  chapter. 

(i.)  The  information  is  far  from  complete;  it  gives  a  very 
imperfect  view  of  the  state  of  society  during  the  period  chosen. 
A  preference  is  given  to  flash  and  startling  facts — to  the  material 
that  is  good  for  pictures  and  for  dazzling  paradoxes.  Hardly  any- 
thing is  told  us  concerning  the  machinery  of  commerce,  the  machi- 
nery of  government,  or  the  system  of  ranks ;  he  says  nothing 


EXPOSITION.  123 

about  that  important  social  fact  how  far  it  was  possible  to  pass 
from  one  station  in  life  to  another.  The  chapter  remains  a  great 
achievement  for  a  historian  who  was  not  also  a  special  antiquarian, 
and  who  did  not  make  even  history  his  exclusive  work ;  but  it  is 
far  from  being  a  complete  sketch  of  the  period. 

(2.)  There  is,  as  already  noticed,  no  principle  of  order — no 
endeavour  to  help  the  reader's  memory.  When  we  study  the 
chapter,  we  can  trace  in  the  succession  of  subjects  a  certain  train 
of  association ;  but  there  is  slight  connection  apparent  upon  the 
surface,  and  one's  impression  at  the  end  of  the  whole  is  not  a  little 
confused.  The  population  leads  him  to  speak  of  the  taxation  as 
the  only  reliable  means  of  getting  at  the  population  ;  the  taxation 
suggests  the  public  expenditure;  the  public  expenditure  the  public 
resources,  agriculture  and  mining ;  agriculture  leads  to  rent ;  rent 
to  the  country  squire ;  the  squire  to  the  clergyman, — and  so  on. 
On  such  a  method,  or  rather  no-method,  there  could  be  nothing 
but  intricacy  and  confusion. 

Exposition. 

We  have  already  seen  how  far  Macaulay  possesses  the  gifts  of 
an  able  expositor.  /T,With  his  mastery  of  language,  he  can  repeat 
his  statements  in  great  variety  of  forms.O  In  his  love  of  antithesis 
he  often  has  recourse  to  the  obverse  form  o(f ,  repetition.  He  has 
an  incomparable  command  of  examples  ancrillustrations.  Thus, 
of  all  the  four  great  arts  of  exposition  he  is  a  master. 

Yet  he  cannot  rank  as  an  expositor  with  such  a  writer  as  Paley. 
This  is  partly  on  account  of  a  deduction  that  must  be  made  from 
his  powers  of  accurate  exposition.  He  is  too  fond  of  extreme  and 
"  sensational "  examples,  and  of  easy  concrete  illustrations  not 
restricted  to  the  relevant  point.  But  the  great  detraction  is,  that 
he  did  not  exhibit  his  powers,  like  Paley,  on  subjects  of  consider- 
able inherent  difficulty. 

Macaulay's  bent  was  naturally  towards  subjects  of  popular  in- 
terest. Whatever  he  cared  to  master  he  could  expound  with  the 
utmost  clearness ;  but  he  had  little  inclination  for  hard  abstract 
principles.  His  'Notes  on  the  Indian  Penal  Code'  are  hardly  an 
exception.  He  has  to  support  the  provisions  of  the  Code  by 
general  considerations,  and  his  statement  of  these  considerations 
is  very  clear  and  very  interesting.  But  the  subject  is  not  natu- 
rally dry  and  repulsive.  There  is  no  greater  temptation  to  make 
the  Notes  abstruse  than  there  is  to  make  a  critical  essay  abstruse. 
He  makes  them  interesting  and  animated  by  exactly  the  same 
arts  of  style  as  give  such  interest  and  animation  to  his  essays. 
He  mixes  up  the  statement  of  the  general  principles  with  particu- 
lar cases  :  sometimes,  without  stating  the  principle  at  all,  he  merely 
suggests  it  by  saying  that  the  particular  provision  he  is  defending 


124  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

rests  on  the  same  principle  as  some  familiar  rule  of  English  law. 
He  finds  ample  scope  for  antithesis  in  contrasting  other  Penal 
Codes  with  the  various  provisions  of  the  Code  recommended  for 
India.  Not  even  paradoxes  are  wanting ;  he  surprises  us  at  times 
by  finding  unsuspected  reasons  for  departing  from  some  familiar 
practice — such  as  the  practice  of  allowing  in  certain  cases  an  option 
between  fine  and  imprisonment. 

Persuasion. 

Macaulay  was  a  very  popular  orator.  Soon  after  he  entered 
Parliament,  he  spoke  in  the  same  debate  with  the  late  Lord 
Derby ;  and  Sir  James  Mackintosh  describes  their  speeches  as 
"two  of  the  finest  speeches  ever  spoken  in  Parliament"  And 
many  men  still  living  confess  that  their  prejudices  against  the 
Reform  Bill  of  1832  were  first  overcome  by  his  eloquent  and  per- 
spicuous arguments. 

His  speeches  are  not  the  only  evidence  of  his  debating  power. 
He  is  essentially  a  controversialist :  it  is  hardly  an  exaggeration 
to  say  that  he  never  makes  a  statement  without  attempting  to 
prove  it.  His  history  is  a  protracted  argument  in  favour  of  the 
Revolution.  The  "Third  Chapter"  is  a  broadside  against  the 
superiority  of  former  days.  When  he  has  no  real  opponent  to 
refute,  no  actual  prejudice  to  overturn,  he  imagines  all  sorts  of 
objections  for  the  purpose  of  proving  them  to  be  groundless. 
His  '  Notes  on  the  Indian  Penal  Code '  are  defences  against 
supposed  objections.  His  Essay  on  Warren  Hastings  is  a  plea 
under  the  disguise  of  a  judicial  summing  up.  Not  that  he 
argues  solely  from  the  love  of  argument ;  always  in  earnest,  he 
is  eager  to  bring  others  round  to  his  own  views — ever  bent  upon 
convincing  and  converting. 

This  determination  to  persuade  is  at  the  root  of  his  efforts  to 
make  himself  understood  by  everybody,  already  noticed  as  the 
main  cause  of  his  simplicity  of  style.  He  is  not  content  to 
utter  an  opiniqn  in  a  form  intelligible  from  his  own  point  of 
view :  having  constantly  before  him  the  desire  to  convince  all 
classes  of  minds,  he  asks  how  the  opinion  will  be  regarded 
by  people  of  opposite  sentiments,  and  shapes  his  statement  ac- 
cordingly. 

Knowledge  of  those  addressed. — Macaulay's  audience  may  be 
said  to  have  been  the  whole  English-speaking  world.  That  he 
knew  many  favourite  maxims  and  ways  of  looking  at  things,  is 
sufficiently  proved  by  his  wide  popularity. 

He  humoured  in  an  especial  manner  two  feelings  that  are  said 
to  be  peculiarly  English — love  of  the_  practical  as  opposed  to  the 
theoretical,  and  love  of  material  progress.  He  "  distrusts  all 
general  theories  of  government ; "  he  was  intensely  inimical  to 


PERSUASION.  125 

James  Mill's  Essay  on  Government  He  loves  gradual  changes ; 
he  professes  a  horror  of  revolutions  and  a  contempt  for  Radicals. 
And  while  a  stanch  friend  to  intellectual  and  moral  progress, 
he  is  far  from  seeing  any  danger  to  either  in  the  multiplication 
of  physical  comforts:  he  exults  in  the  English  "public  credit 
fruitful  of  marvels ; "  and  one  of  the  ideals  that  he  "  wishes 
from  his  soul "  to  see  realised  is,  "  employment  always  plentiful, 
wages  always  high,  food  always  cheap,  and  a  large  family  con- 
sidered not  as  an  encumbrance,  but  as  a  blessing." 

Another  thing  that  could  not  fail  to  endear  him  is  his  out- 
spoken pride  of  country.  By  the  mixture  of  races  in  our  island 
was  formed,  he  says,  "a  people  inferior  to  none  existing  in  the 
world."  Englishmen  "  were  then,  as  they  are  still,  a  brave, 
proud,  and  high-spirited  race,  unaccustomed  to  defeat,  to  shame, 
or  to  servitude." 

Means  of  Persuasion. — (i.)  Always  perfectly  master  of  the 
facts  of  his  subject,  he  displays  the  highest  rhetorical  ingenuity 
in  giving  happy  turns  to  opposing  arguments.  This  was  one 
great  secret  of  his  success  in  the  Reforming  Parliaments  of  1831 
and  1832.  Hardly  an  argument  could  be  advanced  but  he  turned 
it  against  the  speaker — maintaining  with  all  his  paradoxical  point 
that  it  was  precisely  the  consideration  that  led  him  to  advocate 
Reform.  The  Reformers  were  taunted  with  a  leaning  to  universal 
suffrage.  "  Every  argument,"  returns  Macaulay,  "  which  would 
induce  me  to  oppose  universal  suffrage,  induces  me  to  support 
the  plan  which  is  now  before  us.  I  am  opposed  to  universal 
suffrage  because  I  think  that  it  would  produce  a  destructive 
revolution.  I  support  this  plan  because  I  am  sure  that  it  is 
our  best  security  against  a  revolution."  Again,  in  answer  to 
the  hackneyed  appeal  to  the  wisdom  of  our  ancestors,  he  says, 
"We  talk  of  the  wisdom  of  our  ancestors;  and  in  one  respect, 
at  least,  they  were  wiser  than  we.  They  legislated  for  their 
own  times.  They  looked  at  the  England  which  was  before 
them.  They  did  not  think  it  necessary  to  give  twice  as  many 
members  to  York  as  they  gave  to  London,  because  York  had 
been  the  capital  of  Britain  in  the  time  of  Constantius  Chlorus  ; " 
and  so  on.  Again,  "  It  is  precisely  because  our  institutions 
are  so  good  that  we  are  not  perfectly  contented  with  them ; 
for  they  have  educated  us  into  a  capacity  for  enjoying  still 
better  institutions."  Once  more — the  promoters  of  the  Anatomy 
Bill  were  accused  of  trying  to  make  a  law  to  benefit  the  rich 
at  the  expense  of  the  poor.  "Sir,"  said  Macaulay,  "the  fact 
is  the  direct  reverse.  This  is  a  bill  which-  tends  especially  to 
benefit  the  poor ; "  and  he  proceeded  to  prove  his  assertion  by 
examples. 

Another  of  the  devices  of  his  fertile  ingenuity  and  perfect  ac- 


126  THOMAS  BABINGTON   MACAULAY. 

quaintance  with  his  subject  is  to  accuse  his  Conservative  opponents 
of  holding  dangerous  principles.  He  carries  the  war  into  the 
enemy's  country.  "  If,"  cries  the  Member  for  the  University  of 
Oxford — "  If  we  pass  this  law,  England  will  soon  be  a  Republic. 
The  Reformed  House  of  Commons  will,  before  it  has  sate  ten 
years,  depose  the  King  and  expel  the  Lords  from  their  House." 

"Sir,"  returns  Macaulay.  "if  my  honourable  friend  could  prove  this,  he 
would  have  succeeded  in  bringing  an  argument  for  democracy  infinitely 
stronger  than  any  that,  is  to  be  found 'in  the  works  of  Paine.  My  honourable 
friend's  proposition  is  in  fact  this :  that  our  monarchical  and  aristocratical 
institutions  have  no  hold  en  the  public  mind  of  England  ;  that  these  insti- 
tutions are  regarded  with  aversion  by  a  decided  majority  of  the  middle  class. 
.  .  .  Now,  sir,  if  I  were  convinced  that  the  great  body  of  the  mi' Idle  class 
in  England  look  with  aversion  on  monarchy  and  aristocracy,  I  should  be 
forced,  much  against  my  will,  to  come  to  this  conclusion,  that  monarchical 
and  aristocratical  institutions  are  unsuited  to  my  country." 
• 

So  when  they  opposed  the  disfranchisement  of  the  Rotten  Bor- 
oughs on  the  ground  that  it  was  spoliation  of  property,  Macaulay 
warned  them  of  the  danger  of  such  a  principle  : — 

"You  bind  up  two  very  different  things  in  the  hope  that  they  may  stand 
together.  Take  heed  that  they  do  not  fall  together.  You  tell  the  people 
that  it  is  as  unjust  to  disfranchise  a  great  lord's  nomination  borough  as  to 
confiscate  hi-i  estate.  Take  heed  that  you  do  not  succeed  in  convincing  weak 
and  ignorant  minds  that  there  is  no  more  injustice  in  confiscating  his  estate 
than  in  disfranchising  his  borough." 

(2.)  His  powers  of  drawing  a  strong  and  vivid  picture  are  of 
great  service  in  helping  him  to  make  out  his  case.  In  arguing  on 
the  Reform  Bill,  he  was  at  great  pains  to  make  a  powerful  state- 
ment of  the  inequalities  of  the  existing  system  of  representation, 
and  sketched  with  his  best  vigour  the  following  strong  example  : — 

"  If,  sir,  I  wished  to  make  such  a  foreigner  clearly  understand  what  I  con- 
sider as  the  great  defects  of  our  system,  I  would  conduct  him  through  that 
Immense  citv  which  lies  to  the  north  of  Great  Russell  Street  and  Oxford 
Street — a  city  superior  in  size  and  in  population  to  the  capitals  of  many 
mighty  kingdoms  ;  and  probably  superior  in  opulence,  intelligence,  and 
general  respectability  to  any  city  in  the  world.  I  would  conduct  him  through 
that  interminable  succession  of  streets  and  squares,  all  consisting  of  well- 
built  and  well-furnished  houses.  I  would  make  him  observe  the  brilliancy 
of  the  shops,  and  the  crowd  of  well-appointed  equipages.  I  would  show  1m:: 
that  magnificent  circle  of  palaces  which  surrounds  the  Regent's  Park.  1 
would  tell  him  that  the  rental  of  this  district  was  far  greater  than  that  of 
the  whole  kingdom  of  Scotland  at  the  time  of  the  Union.  And  then  I  would 
tell  him  that  this  was  an  unrepresented  district." 

To  take  another  well-known  instance.  In  answer  to  the  common 
objection  that  the  Reform  Bill  would  not  be  final,  he  argued  that 
finality  was  not  to  be  expected — that  a  changed  state  of  society 
might  again  call  for  a  change  in  the  representation.  His  manner 
of  putting  the  possibilities  of  change  was  characteristic  : — 


PERSUASION.  127 

"Another  generation  may  find  in  the  new  representative  system  defects 
such  as  we  find  in  the  old  representative  system.  Civilisation  will  proceed. 
Wealth  will  increase.  Industry  and  trade  will  find  out  new  seats.  The 
same  causes  which  have  turned  so  many  villages  into  great  towns,  which 
have  turned  so  many  thousands  of  square  miles  of  fir  and  heath  into  corn- 
fields and  orchards,  will  continue  to  operate.  Who  can  say  that  a  hundred 
years  hence  there  may  not  be,  on  the  shore  of  some  desolate  and  silent  bay  in 
the  Hebrides,  another  Liverpool  with  its  docks  and  warehouses  and  endless 
forests  of  masts  t  Who  can  say  that  the  huge  chimneys  of  another  Manchester 
may  not  rise  in  the  wilds  of  Connemara  1  For  our  children  we  do  not  pre- 
tend to  legislate." 

(3.)  His  great  powers  of  debate  appear  chiefly  in  refutation.  He 
is  critical  rather  than  constructive.  He  takes  delight  in  exposing 
false  analogies  and  false  generalities,  and  in  showing  that  anticipa- 
tions are  not  warranted  by  previous  experience. 

When  he  can  put  a  doctrine  upon  the  horns  of  a  dilemma,  he 
tosses  it  with  great  spirit  A  good  instance  is  his  assault  on 
primogeniture ;  which  also  illustrates  his  habit  of  referring  all 
generalities  to  the  fundamental  particulars,  and  his  favourite  man- 
ner of  retorting  that  the  facts  prove  exactly  the  opposite  of  what 
is  asserted : — 

"  It  is  evident  that  this  theory,  though  intended  to  strengthen  the  foun- 
dations of  Government,  altogether  unsettles  them.  Did  the  divine  and  im- 
mutable law  of  primogeniture  admit  females  or  exclude  them  ?  On  either 
supposition,  half  the  sovereigns  of  Europe  must  be  usurper* ,  reisoring  in  de- 
fiance of  the  commands  of  heaven,  and  might  be  justly  dispossessed  by  the 
rightful  heirs.  These  absurd  doctrines  received  no  countenance  from  the 
Old  Testament ;  for  in  the  Old  Testament  we  read  that  the  chosen  people 
were  blamed  and  punished  for  desiring  a  king,  and  that  they  were  afterwards 
commanded  to  withdraw  their  allegiance  from  him.  Their  whole  history, 
far  from  favouring  the  notion  that  primogeniture  is  of  divine  institution, 
would  rather  seem  to  indicate  that  younger  brothers  are  under  the  special  pro- 
tection of  heaven.  Isaac  was  not  the  eldest  son  of  Abraham,  nor  Jacob  of 
Isaac,  nor  Judah  of  Jacob,  nor  David  of  Jesse,  nor  Solomon  of  David.  In- 
deed, the  order  of  seniority  among  children  is  seldom  strictly  jegarded  in 
countries  where  polygamy  is  practised." 

Examples,  actual  cases,  which  he  lays  down  in  such  numbers, 
often  have  the  effect  of  a  proof,  being  the  actual  foundation  of  the 
general  proposition.  His  illustration  in  the  debate  on  the  Anatomy 
Bill  of  the  assertion  that  the  poor  suffer  more  by  bad  surgery  than 
the  rich,  has  something  of  this  effect : — 

"Who  suffers  by  the  bad  state  of  the  Russian  school  of  surgery?  The 
Emperor  Nicholas  f  By  no  means.  The  whole  evil  falls  on  the  peasantry. 
If  the  education  of  a  surgeon  should  become  very  expensive,  if  the  fees  ot 
surgeons  should  consequently  rise,  if  the  supply  of  regular  surgeons  should 
diminish,  the  sufferers  would  be,  not  the  rich,  but  the  poor  in  our  country 
villages,  who  would  again  be  left  to  mountebanks,  and  barbers,  and  old 
women,  and  charms,  and  quack  medicines." 

Perhaps  the  best  example  of  his  irresistible  use  of  facts  to  en- 
force his  views  is  to  be  seen  in  his  speeches  on  the  proposals  to 


128  THOMAS  BABINGTON   MACAULAT. 

extend  Copyright  He  runs  over  the  principal  men  in  English 
literature,  and  examines  how  the  law  would  have  operated  with 
them.  Would  it  have  induced  Dr  Johnson  to  labour  more  assidu- 
ously had  he  known  that  a  bookseller,  whose  grandfather  had  pur- 
chased the  copyright  of  his  works  from  his  residuary  legatee  Black 
Frank,  would  be  in  1841  drawing  large  profits  from  the  monopoly  ? 
Would  it  have  induced  him  to  give  one  more  allegory,  one  more 
life  of  a  poet,  one  more  imitation  of  Juvenal  ? 

Very  often  his  concrete  comparisons  are  of  the  nature  of  argu- 
ments by  analogy.  His  speech  on  the  war  with  China,  defending 
the  Government  from  tbe  charge  of  having  brought  on  the  war  by 
mismanagement,  abounds  in  comparisons  of  this  sort.  One  of  the 
charges  was  that  the  instructions  sent  to  the  superintendent  were 
vague  and  meagre,  to  which  Macaulay  replied  that  it  would  be 
pernicious  meddling  to  attempt  to  direct  in  detail  the  action  of  a 
functionary  fifteen  thousand  miles  off: — 

"How  indeed  is  it  possible  that  they  should  send  him  directions  as  to  the 
details  of  his  administration  ?  Consider  in  what  a  state  the  affairs  of  this 
country  would  be  if  they  were  to  be  conducted  according  to  directions  framed 
by  the  ablest  statesman  residing  in  Bengal.  A  despatch  goes  hence  asking 
for  instructions  while  London  is  illuminating  for  the  peace  of  Amiens.  The 
instructions  arrive  when  the  French  army  is  encamped  at  Boulogne,  and 
when  the  whole  island  is  up  in  arms  to  repel  invasion.  A  despatcli  is  written 
asking  for  instructions  when  Buonaparte  is  at  Elba.  The  instructions  come 
when  he  is  .it  the  Tuilleries.  A  despatch  is  written  asking  for  instructions 
when  he  is  at  the  Tuilleries.  The  instructions  come  wheu  he  is  at  St  Helena. 
It  would  be  just  as  impossible  to  govern  India  in  London  as  to  govern  Eng- 
land at  Calcutta. " 

Here  we  have  substantially  an  argument  by  analogy.  Another 
of  the  charges  brought  against  Government  was,  that  they  made 
no  exertion  to  suppress  the  opium  trade.  This  Macaulay  met  with 
the  assertion  that  it  was  impossible,  supporting  his  assertion  with 
the  following  plausible  parallel : — 

"  In  England  we  have  a  preventive  service  which  costs  us  half  a  million 
a-year.  We  employ  more  than  fifty  cruisers  to  guard  our  coasts.  We  have 
six  thousand  effective  men  whose  business  is  to  intercept  smugglers.  And 
yet  .  .  .  the  quantity  of  brandy  which  comes  iu  without  paying  duty  is 
known  to  be  not  less  than  six  hundred  thousand  gallons  a-year.  Some 
people  think  that  the  quantity  of  tobacco  which  is  imported  clandestinely 
is  as  great  as  the  quantity  which  goes  through  the  custom-house.  .  .  . 
And  all  this,  observe,  has  been  done  in  spite  of  the  most  effective  preventive 
service  that,  I  believe,  ever  existed  in  the  world.  .  .  .  If  we  know  any- 
thing about  the  Chinese  government,  we  know  this,  that  its  coast-guard  is 
neither  trusty  nor  efficient ;  ami  we  know  that  a  coast-guard  as  trusty  and 
as  efficient  as  our  own  would  not  be  able  to  cut  off  communication  between 
the  merchant  longing  for  silver  and  the  smoker  longing  for  his  pipe." 

Any  attempt  at  prevention,  he  says  further,  would  turn  the 
smugglers  into  piratea — 


PERSUASION.  129 

"  Have  not  similar  causes  repeatedly  produced  similar  effects !  Do  we  not 
know  that  the  jealous  vigilance  with  which  Spain  excluded  the  ships  of  other 
nations  from  her  transatlantic  possessions  turned  men  who  would  otherwise 
have  been  honest  merchant  adventurers  into  buccaneers  ?  The  same  causes 
which  raised  up  one  race  of  buccaneers  in  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  would  soon 
have  raised  up  another  in  the  China  sea." 

The  same  sense  of  the  effect  of  dealing  with  propositions  in  the 
concrete  appears  in  another  form.  He  is  anxious  to  reduce  vague 
and  general  charges  to  a  statement  of  facts,  with  a  view  to  show 
the  insufficiency  of  the  real  grounds.  Thus  he  reduces  Sir  James 
Graham's  charge  of  Government  maladministration  in  China  to 
the  following: — 

"  The  charge  against  them  therefore  is  this,  that  they  did  not  give  such 
copious  and  particular  directions  as  were  sufficient,  in  every  possible  emer- 
gency, for  the  guidance  of  a  functionary  who  was  fifteen  thousand  miles  otf." 

His  habit  of  immediately  looking  to  the  facts  when  a  generality 
was  asserted,  often  enabled  him  to  point  out  that  certain  circum- 
stances had  not  been  taken  into  account.  Thus,  in  the  Reform 
debate,  a  member  argued  that  it  was  unjust  to  disfranchise  Aid- 
borough,  because  the  borough  was  as  populous  now  as  in  the  days 
of  Edward  III.,  when  it  was  constituted  an  elective  borough.  True, 
replied  Macaulay,  but  it  ought  to  be  much  more  populous  now  than 
then,  if  it  would  keep  its  position.  Other  towns  have  been  grow- 
ing enormously,  while  Aldborough  has  been  standing  still. 

(4.)  Though  habitually  gladiatorial,  and  always  eager  to  con- 
vince by  argument,  he  shows  considerable  tact  in  recommending 
his  own  view  to  the  feelings  of  the  persons  addressed. 

Throughout  his  History  he  seeks  favour  for  his  own  favourites  by 
representing  them  as  the  champions  of  English  glory.  His  account 
of  Cromwell  may  be  studied  for  artful  touches  of  this  sort.  One 
of  his  most  splendid  paragraphs  is  his  account  of  the  supremacy  of 
England  during  the  Protectorate.  In  equally  enthusiastic  terms 
he  celebrates  the  superiority  of  Cromwell's  pikemen: — 

"The  banished  Cavaliers  felt  an  emotion  of  national  pride  when  they  saw 
a  brigade  of  their  countrymen,  outnumbered  by  foes  and  'abandoned  by 
allies,  drive  before  it  in  headlong  rout  the  finest  infantry  of  Spain,  and  force 
a  passage  into  a  counterscarp  which  had  just  been  pronounced  impregnable 
by  the  ablest  of  the  marshals  of  France." 

In  the  Reform  debates  his  principal  card  was  the  fear  of  pro- 
voking the  people  to  a  revolution.  Again  and  again  he  reiterated 
that  there  were  grounds  for  such  a  fear.  When  Lord  John  Russell 
hinted  at  the  danger  of  disappointing  the  expectations  of  the 
nation,  he  was  accused  of  threatening  the  House.  Macaulay 
defended  the  obnoxious  expression  as  quite  "  parliamentary  and 
decorous,"  and  repeated  his  own  belief  in  the  reality  of  the 
dancer : — 


130  THOMAS   BABINGTON   MACAULA.Y. 

"  I,  sir,  do  entertain  great  apprehension  for  the  fate  of  my  country.  I 
do  in  my  conscience  believe  that  unless  the  plan  proposed,  or  some  similar 
plan,  be  speedily  adopted,  great  and  terrible  calamities  will  befall  us.  En- 
tertaining this  opinion,  I  think  myself  bound  to  state  it,  not  as  a  threat,  but 
as  a  reason. " 

In  more  than  one  of  the  debates  he  held  up  the  French  Revolu- 
tion as  a  warning : — 

"  The  French  nobles  delayed  too  long  any  concession  to  the  popular 
demands.  Because  they  resisted  reform  in  1783,  they  had  to  resist  revolu- 
tion in  1789.  They  would  not  endure  Turgot,  and  they  had  to  endure 
Robespierre. "  » 

In  one  speech  he  drew  a  vivid  picture  of  the  destruction  of  the 
nobility,  and  asked — 

"  Why  were  they  scattered  over  the  face  of  the  earth,  their  titles  abolished, 
their  escutcheons  defaced,  their  parks  wasted,  their  palaces  dismantled,  their 
heritages  given  to  strangers  ?  Because  they  had  no  sympathy  with  the 
people,  no  discernment  of  the  signs  of  their  time  ;  because,  in  the  pride  and 
narrowness  of  their  hearts,  they  called  those  whose  warnings  might  have 
saved  them  theorists  and  speculators  ;  because  they  refused  all  concession 
until  the  time  had  arrived  when  no  concession  would  avail." 


CHAPTEE   IIL 


THOMAS     CARLYLE, 

1795 — 1880. 

THOMAS  CARLYLE,  "  The  Censor  of  the  Age,"  as  he  has  been 
called,  was  an  author  by  profession.  In  his  famous  petition  on 
the  Copyright  Bill,  written  in  1839,  he  described  himself  as  "  a 
writer  of  books." 

He  was  born  at  Ecclefechan,  in  Dumfriesshire,  on  the  24th  of 
December  1795.  His  father  was  a  mason  in  that  village,  after- 
wards a  peasant  farmer  near  it ;  sprung  from  strong  and  turbulent 
Borderers,  himself  respected  for  his  uprightness,  thoroughness  of 
industry,  and  a  certain  sarcastic  energy  of  speech.  Of  this  cold, 
stern,  upright  father,  whose  "  heart  seemed  as  if  walled  in,"  and  of 
his  mother,  to  whom  he  was  warmly  attached,  Carlyle  has  left  a  vivid 
picture  in  his  '  Reminiscences.' 

Thomas,  the  eldest  son  of  a  family  of  nine,  received  the  book 
education  common  to  hundreds  of  young  Scotchmen  in  the  same 
condition  of  life.  He  was  taught  to  read  by  his  mother  and  the 
village  schoolmaster ;  taught  the  rudiments  of  Latin  by  the  minis- 
ter of  his  sect :  then,  after  some  training  in  the  higher  branches  of 
learning  at  the  burgh  school  of  Annan,  he  proceeded  to  the  Univer- 
sity of  Edinburgh.  • 

When  he  entered  the  University,  he  had  not  quite  completed  his 
fifteenth  year.  Some  of  his  professors  were  men  of  note  :  Dunbar, 
Professor  of  Greek ;  Leslie,  Professor  of  Mathematics ;  Playfair, 
Professor  of  Natural  Philosophy ;  Thomas  Brown,  Professor  of 
Logic  and  Moral  Philosophy.  Young  Carlyle  was  a  hard  student. 
He  applied  himself  diligently  to  classics.  To  Brown's  lectures  he 
gave  little  attention,  having  a  strong  distaste  for  the  analytic  mode 
of  dealing  with  mind,  but  the  lectures  in  science  he  mastered  thor- 


132  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

oughly  :  natural  liking  for  the  subject,  or  the  professor's  enthu 
siasm,  or  accident,  led  him  to  make  mathematics  his  principal 
study.  He  prosecuted  the  high  mathematics  for  a  long  time  with 
the  greatest  ardour.  It  was  in  his  devotion  to  this  subject  that  he 
first  injured  his  naturally  robust  health.  He  became  a  mathemat- 
ical teacher,  and  at  one  time  was  a  candidate  for  the  Professorship 
of  Astronomy  in  Glasgow.  Traces  of  these  studies  appear  not 
only  in  his  figurative  allusions,  but  in  an  amount  of  scientific 
method  far  beyond  what  is  generally  found  in  writers  of  high 
imagination. 

But  it  was  outside  the  range  of  academical  studies  that  the 
young  student's  principal  and  most  profitable  work  lay.  He  was 
the  oracle  of  a  small  band  of  youths,  poor  like  himself,  and  ambi- 
tious of  literary  distinction,  who  read  extensively  in  the  Univer- 
sity library,  and  discussed  what  they  read  with  free  enthusiasm.  All 
of  them  seem  to  have  predicted  future  greatness  for  Carlyle.  To 
one  "  foolish  flattering  "  prediction  of  this  kind  he  replied,  in  his 
nineteenth  year,  in  the  following  characteristic  strain :  "  Think 
not,  because  I  talk  thus,  I  am  careless  of  literary  fame.  No  ;  hea- 
ven knows  that,  ever  since  I  have  been  able  to  form  a  wish,  the 
wish  of  being  known  has  been  the  foremost.  Oh,  Fortune  !  thou 
that  givest  unto  each  his  portion  in  this  dirty  planet,  bestow  (if 
it  shall  please  thee)  coronets,  and  crowns,  and  principalities,  and 
purses,  and  pudding,  and  powers,  upon  the  great  and  noble  and  fat 
ones  of  the  earth.  Grant  me,  that  with  a  heart  of  independence, 
unyielding  to  thy  favours  and  unbending  to  thy  frowns,  I  may 
attain  to  literary  fame ;  and  though  starvation  be  my  lot,  I  will 
smile  that  I  have  not  been  born  a  king." 

Although,  thirty  years  later,  Carlyle  wrote  scornfully  about  "  the 
goose  goddess  which  they  call  Fame!  Ach  GottJ" — this  youthful 
rhodomontade  gives  the  key  to  the  spirit  of  his  future  struggles. 
For  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  he  laboured  till  his  ambition  was 
attained  ;  but  he  held  to  it  with  fierce  energy,  even  when  starva- 
tion stared  him  in  the  face ;  and  he  obtained  fame  at  last  on  his 
own  terms,  without  any  sacrifice  of  his  independence. 

It  was  to  teaching  that  he  first  turned  himself  for  a  livelihood. 
In  the  end  of  May  1814  he  quitted  Edinburgh,  having  gone  through 
the  usual  curriculum  in  arts ;  and,  by  competitive  trial  at  Dum- 
fries, got  the  teachership  of  mathematics  in  the  burgh  school  of 
Annan,  where,  as  we  have  mentioned,  he  had  himself  been  a  scholar. 
After  two  years'  service  in  that  post,  he  was,  through  the  recom- 
mendation of  his  Edinburgh  professors,  offered  the  teachership  of 
mathematics  and  classics  in  the  burgh  school  of  Kirkcaldy,  and 
held  that  appointment  also  for  about  two  years.  In  Kirkcaldy  he 
made  the  intimate  acquaintance  of  Edward  Irving,  who,  like  him- 
self, hud  been  a  schoolboy  at  Annan,  and  who  for  some  years 


LIFE.  Iblj 

was  master  of  a  "  venture  school "  in  Kirkcaldy,  known  as  "  The 
Academy." 

The  time  spent  by  Carlyle  in  schoolmastering,  and  its  probable 
influence  on  his  habits  of  thought  and  feeling,  have  been  a  little 
exaggerated.  He  nBver  liked  it,  and  was  barely  three-and-twenty 
when  he  gave  it  up.  In  the  end  of  1818  he  left  Kirkcaldy,  and 
went  across  to  Edinburgh;  with  no  definite  prospects,  but  with  a 
vague  notion  of  trying  to  live  by  literature.  He  spent  some  three 
years  in  Edinburgh,  mainly  in  what  he  would  call  "  stony-ground 
husbandries,"  the  three  gloomiest  years  of  his  life — out  of  health, 
troubled  in  mind,  finding  comfort  only  in  a  "sacred  defiance"  of 
death  as  the  worst  that  could  happen.  His  only  known  literary 
\vork  during  those  years  was  the  composition  of  certain  articles  for 
Brewster's  '  Edinburgh  Encyclopedia.'  During  this  period  also  he 
resumed  his  reading  in  the  University  library;  extended  his  know- 
ledge of  Italian,  Spanish,  and  especially  German ;  and  devoured 
extraordinary  numbers  of  books  on  history,  poetry  (in  a  moderate 
degree),  romance,  and  general  information  as  to  all  countries,  and 
all  things  of  popular  interest  In  1822  he  became  tutor  to  Charles 
Buller,  an  appointment  that  relieved  him  from  a  good  deal  of  dis- 
tasteful drudgery,  and  left  him  time  for  literary  plans. 

In  1823  he  sent  to  the  'London  Magazine'  the  first  instalment 
of  his  'Life  of  Schiller.'  In  1824  his  publications  were  numerous; 
he  finished  his  '  Life  of  Schiller,'  and  produced  a  translation  of 
'  Legendre's  Geometry,'  with  an  original  Essay  on  Proportion,  as 
well  as  his  first  notable  work,  the  translation  of  '  Wilhelm  Meister.' 
During  the  next  two  years,  having  broken  off  his  connection  with 
the  Buliers,  he  laboured  at  translations  from  the  German,  "  honest 
journey-work,  not  of  his  own  suggesting  or  desiring."  In  1825  his 
Schiller  appeared  in  a  separate  form. 

The  most  memorable  incident  in  those  years  was  Carlyle's  ac- 
quaintance with  the  remarkable  woman  who  afterwards  became 
his  wife,  Miss  Jane  Welsh,  only  daughter  of  Dr  \Velsh,  a  lineal 
descendant  of  John  Knox.  The  marriage  took  place  in  1826,  after 
three  years  of  intellectual  courtship,  and  did  not  prove  a  happy  one 
for  the  lady.  A  brilliant,  clever,  sprightly  woman,  made  much  of  by 
her  father  as  an  only  child,  and  humoured  by  him  in  her  love  for 
literature,  she  despised  commonplace  suitors  of  her  own  degree, 
and  was  attracted  by  the  force  of  Carlyle's  unconventional  talk  in 
spite  of  his  rugged  exterior.  She  "  married  for  ambition,"  as  she 
afterwards  said,  and  her  discernment  of  Carlyle's  power  was  ultim- 
ately fully  justified,  but  she  had  not  calculated  rightly  the  extent 
of  the  bitter  sacrifices  she  had  to  make  for'  the  companionship. 
That  her  life  was  not  so  wholly  joyless  as  might  appear  from  her 
published  letters,  we  may  well  imagine ;  but  as  the  household 
slave  of  a  man  of  genius  absorbed  in  his  work,  habitually  gloomy 


134  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

and  irritable,  taking  all  her  sacrifices  as  matters  of  ordinary  duty, 
never  recognising  them  as  sacrifices,  ruthlessly  rebuking  her  weak- 
nesses, and  making  no  acknowledgment  of  her  ministrations  to  his 
comfort,  her  lot  was  far  from  cheerful.  She  did  not  and  could 
not  understand  before  actual  experience  the  meaning  of  "marrying 
for  ambition  "  a  man  with  an  ambition  so  hungry  and  ruthless  as 
Carlyle's. 

For  some  two  years  after  his  marriage  Carlyle  lived  in  Edin- 
burgh, drudging  at  literature  and  casting  about  for  some  settled 
employment,  such  as  a  professorship.  Then,  in  1828,  much  against 
Mrs  Carlyle's  wish,  finding  neither  pleasure  nor  profit  in  Edin- 
burgh society,  he  retired  to  Craigenputtoch,  a  small  property 
belonging  to  his  wife,  situated  about  a  day's  journey  east  of  his 
native  Ecclefechan.  At  Craigenputtoch  he  lived  about  six  years. 
His  manner  of  life  he  described  in  an  often-quoted  letter  to  Goethe, 
with  whom  he  had  been  brought  into  correspondence  by  his  trans- 
lation of  '  Wilhelm  Meister.'  He  had  retired  to  his  own  "bit  of 
earth "  to  "  secure  the  independence  through  which  he  could  be 
enabled  to  remain  true  to  himself."  "Six  miles  from  any  one 
likely  to  visit  him,"  "  in  the  loveliest  nook  of  Scotland,"  he  yet 
kept  himself  informed  of  what  was  passing  in  the  literary  world  ; 
he  had  "piled  upon  the  table  of  his  little  Horary  a  whole  cartload  of 
French,  German,  American,  and  English  journals  and  periodicals." 
"True  to  himself"  Carlyle  undoubtedly  was  then  as  at  all  times, 
setting  his  face  with  ferocious  resolution  against  imitation  of  any 
style  or  vein  of  thought  or  sentiment  that  could  be  called  popular, 
not  merely  determined  to  deliver  his  message  in  his  own  way,  but 
as  yet  undecided  \\  hat  his  message  was  to  be,  and  searching  for  one 
with  desperate  sighing  and  groaning.  Jeffrey  took  a  warm  inter- 
est in  himself  and  his  wife,  and  implored,  scolded,  and  argued  in 
a  vain  endeavour  to  persuade  him  to  submit  to  commonplace  taste. 
Carlyle  would  write  in  his  own  way  and  on  his  own  themes  or  not 
at  all.  The  consequence  was,  that  all  through  those  years  he  was 
in  constant  difficulties  with  publishers  and  editors,  and  in  the 
direst  pecuniary  straits,  all  the  more  that  he  gave  generous  help 
to  a  younger  brother,  and  refused  to  touch  a  penny  of  his  wife's 
income  as  long  as  her  mother  was  alive.  The  articles  reprinted  in 
the  three  first  volumes  of  his  '  Miscellanies '  were  written  at  this 
time.  Several  literary  plans  had,  to  be  abandoned  because  no 
publisher  would  take  them  up.  The  idea  occurred  to  him  of 
taking  his  own  struggle  for  existence  as  a  theme,  and  he  gave  in 
'  Sartor  Itesartus '  his  passionate  commentary  on  a  world  in  which 
he  found  it  so  hard  to  live  in  his  own  way,  and  which  seemed  to 
him  so  full  of  matter  for  scornful  laughter  and  pity  and  indigna- 
tion. This  strangely  original  work,  in  which  Carlyle  was  much 
more  defiantly  singular  than  he  had  ever  been  before,  was  re- 


LIFE.  135 

jected  by  several  publishers,  but  at  length  saw  the  light  as  a 
series  of  articles  in  'Eraser's  Magazine/  1833-34,  and  its  singular- 
ity and  force  drew  upon  the  author  more  attention  than  he  had 
hitherto  received. 

In  1834  he  removed  to  the  London  suburb  now  associated  with 
his  name.  The  "  Seer  of  Chelsea"  is  now  as  familiar  a  synonym 
as  "the  glorious  Dreamer  of  Highgate."  But  when  he  came  to 
London,  it  was  almost  as  a  last  desperate  move.  He  was  known 
to  the  dispensers  of  literary  work  only  as  an  obstinately  peculiar 
and  fantastic  individual  In  America  he  was  more  quickly  ap- 
preciated. Emerson  and  others  pressed  him  to  settle  there,  and  his 
'Sartor'  and  his  occasional  essays  were  reprinted  at  Boston  in  1836. 
His  first  success  in  London  was  as  a  lecturer.  In  1837  he  gave  to 
"  a  very  crowded,  yet  a  select,  audience "  in  London  a  course  of 
six  public  lectures  on  German  literature;  in  1838  a  course  of 
twelve  "  On  the  History  of  Literature,  or  the  Successive  Periods 
of  European  Culture;"  in  1839  a  course  on  "the  Revolutions  of 
Modern  Europe;"  in  1840  a  course  on  "  Heroes,  Hero-Worship, 
and  the  Heroic  in  History."  l  These  lectures  made  a  sensation 
in  fashionable  literary  circles;  the  rugged  English,  the  Scotch 
accent,  the  emphatic  sing-song  cadence,  combined  with  the  lofti- 
ness and  originality  of  the  matter,  drew  crowds  to  hear  the  new 
prophet.  "  It  was,"  said  Leigh  Hunt,  "  as  if  some  Puritan  had 
come  to  life  again,  liberalised  by  German  philosophy  and  his  own 
intense  reflections  and  experiences." 

Meanwhile  his  master-works  began  to  appear.  During  his  first 
year's  residence  in  London,  he  had  written  with  fiercely  earnest 
labour  the  first  volume  of  a  work  on  the  French  Revolution. 
There  is  not  a  more  deeply  interesting  chapter  in  literary  history 
than  Mr  Froude's  account  of  the  accidental  destruction  of  this 
manuscript,  "  written  as  with  his  heart's  blood,"  and  of  the  almost 
unconquerable  repugnance  and  heroic  effort  with  which  Carlyle 
set  himself  to  do  the  work  over  again.  At  last,  in  1837,  the 
'  French  Revolution '  appeared,  and  Carlyle  secured  the  fame  for 
which  he  had  wrestled  so  long.  Henceforward  publishers  let  him 
deliver  his  message  as  he  liked.  In  1838  'Sartor  Resurtus,' 
"hitherto  a  mere  aggregate  of  Magazine  articles,"  emerged  from 
its  "  bibliopolic  difficulties,"  and  became  a  book.  The  same  year 
witnessed  the  first  edition  of  his  '  Miscellanies.'  In  1839  he 
published,  under  the  title  of  'Chartism,'  his  first  attack  on  the 
corruption  of  modern  society,  and  the  futility  of  all  extant  projects 
of  reform.  In  1843  he  followed  up  'Chartism'  with  'Past  and 
Present'  In  1845  ne  published  his  'Cromwell's  Letters  and 
Speeches,'  which  met  with  a  more  rapid  sale  than  any  of  his  pre- 
vious works.  In  1850  he  returned,  in  his  '  Latter-Day  Pamphlets,' 

• '  The  last  course  only  lias  l>een  published. 


13G  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

to  the  condition  of  society,  pouring  forth  unmeasured  contempt  on 
"  The  Nigger  Question,"  "  The  Present  Time,"  "  Model  Prisons," 
"Downing  Street,"  "The  New  Downing  Street,"  "Stump  Orators," 
"Parliaments,"  "Hudson's  Statue,"  "Jesuitism."  Next  year 
appeared  his  '  Biography  of  John  Sterling.'  Thereafter  he  was 
occupied  exclusively  with  his  great  historical  work,  '  The  History 
of  Frederick  II.,  commonly  called  The  Great.'  The  two  first  vol- 
umes were  published  in  1858,  other  two  in  1862,  and  in  1865  the 
work  was  completed. 

In  the  session  of  1865-66  he  was  elected  Lord  Rector  by  the 
students  of  Edinburgh  University;  and  on  April  2,  1866,  de- 
livered to  a  crowded  and  enthusiastic  audience  his  famous  Instal- 
lation Address.  He  was  not  suffered  long  to  enjoy  the  most 
affecting  public  manifestations  that  have  ever  honoured  his  name. 
His  wife  died  before  his  return  to  London :  in  the  very  hour  of 
his  public  triumph  came  the  stroke  of  calamity;  and  the  old 
man  mourned  that  "  the  light  of  his  life  was  quite  gone  out" 
Not  till  after  her  death  did  he  learn  how  much  she  had  suffered 
for  him. 

He  published  nothing  of  importance  during  the  last  fifteen  years 
of  his  life.  Now  and  then  he  made  his  voice  heard  on  questions 
of  passing  interest  In  1867  he  wrote  for  ' Macmillan's  Magazine' 
a  very  gloomy  anticipation  of  the  consequences  of  the  Reform 
Bill,  with  the  suggestive  title,  "  Shooting  Niagara,  and  After  1 " 
In  1869  he  sent  to  the  newspapers  a  letter  on  his  favourite 
"  Emigration."  During  the  war  between  France  and  Germany, 
he  wrote  to  rejoice  over  the  French  defeat,  and  quoted  history  to 
show  that  it  had  been  well  deserved.  His  last  publication  was  a 
series  of  articles  on  the  Portraits  of  John  Knox  and  the  Early 
Kings  of  Norway,  which  appeared  as  a  small  volume  in  1875.  He 
died  at  Chelsea,  February  5,  1881. 

In  his  Rectorial  Address  at  Edinburgh,  being  then  a  patriarch 
of  seventy,  he  addressed  a  kindly  warning  to  his  youthful  hearers 
against  the  physical  dangers  of  too  severe  study.  His  own  strong 
frame  and  great  constitutional  robustness  were  early  impaired  by 
injudicious  closeness  of  application.  During  the  whole  of  his  later 
life  he  suffered  from  dyspepsia.  It  says  much  for  the  native  energy 
of  his  system  that,  in  spite  of  this  depressing — if  not  debilitating 
— disorder,  he  accomplished  such  an  amount  of  solid  work,  retain- 
ing his  powers  to  old  age,  and  writing  with  unabated  vigour  at 
the  extreme  age  of  seventy.  He  had  sufficient  strength  of  will  to 
sustain  what  De  Quincey  always  recognised  as  the  best  remedy  for 
his  "appalling  stomachic  derangement" — namely,  regular  habits 
of  active  exercise. 

We  spoke  of  Macaulay  as  a  man  whose  intellectual  energies  were 


CHARACTER.  137 

to  some  extent  dissipated  upon  various  fields  of  exertion.  Carlyle's 
energies  were  concentrated  with  unparalleled  intensity  upon  liia 
books.  For  nearly  half  a  century  he  gave  the  best  part  of  his 
working  time  to  literature,  pursuing  his  appointed  tasks  with  fre- 
quent fits  of  strong  distaste,  but  with  unalterable  steadiness  of 
aim.  Probably  more  intellectual  force  has  been  spent  upon  the 
production  of  Carlyle's  books  than  upon  the  productions  of  any 
two  .'other  writers  in  general  literature. 

His  powers  of  memory  were  not  of  the  same  universally  and 
immediately  dazzling  order  as  Macaulay's.  Every  person  that 
met  Macaulay  went  away  in  astonishment  at  "  the  stores  which 
his  memory  had  at  instantaneous  command."  In  private  society 
Carlyle  impressed  his  hearers  by  talk  very  much  resembling  the 
general  texture  of  his  writings.  He  had  not  Macaulay's  wide- 
ranging  readiness  of  recollection,  could  not  quote  with  the  same 
instantaneous  fluency,  and  could  not  trust  his  memory  so  confi- 
dently without  a  written  note.  Again — to  compare  him  in  this 
particular  with  De  Quincey— he  does  not  strike  us  as  possessing 
great  multifarious  knowledge.  He  makes  comparatively  few  allu- 
sions beyond  the  circle  of  subjects  that  he  has  specially  studied. 
His  scrupulous  love  of  accuracy  may  have  hampered  the  flowing 
display  of  his  knowledge;  but  within  the  circles  of  his  special 
studies,  his  memory  is  pre-eminently  wonderful.  To  hold  in  mind 
the  varied  materials  of  his  vivid  historical  pictures  was  a  strain  of 
retentive  force  immeasurably  greater  than  was  ever  required  of 
either  De  Quincey  or  Macaulay  for  the  production  of  their  works. 
His  memory  is  singularly  catholic  as  regards  the  kind  of  thing 
remembered ;  he  remembers  names,  dates,  scenical  groupings,  and 
the  characteristic  gestures  and  expressions  of  whole  societies  of 
men,  to  all  appearance  with  equal  fidelity. 

Carlyle  is  sometimes  loosely  spoken  of  as  a  great  "  thinker,"  but 
his  power  does  not  lie  in  the  regions  of  the  dry  understanding,  in 
analysis,  argument,  or  practical  judgment.  In  his  youth  he  was 
distinguished  as  a  mathematician  ;  but  when  he  turned  to  the  study 
of  men,  he  took  fire :  on  anything  connected  with  man,  he  felt  too 
profoundly  to  reason  well  His  whole  nature  rose  in  rebellion 
against  cold-blooded  analysis  and  matter-of-fact  argument  In  his 
works  he  is  never  tired  of  sneering  at  "  Philosophism,"  the  "  Dis- 
mal Science"  of  Political  Economy,  "Attorney  Logic,"  andsuchlika 
He  had  a  natural  antipathy  to  such  ways  of  approaching  men  and 
the  affairs  of  men.  He  was  naturally  incapable  of  De  Quincey's 
pursuit  of  character  or  meaning  into  minute  shades,  and  of  Macau- 
lay's  elaborate  refxatations  by  copious  instance  and  analogy.  Take, 
for  example,  his  Hero-worship.  Instead  of  analysing,  as  De  Quin- 
cey might  have  done,  the  elements  of  greatness  in  his  heroes,  or  of 
producing,  as  Macaulay  might  have  done,  argumentative  arrays  of 


138  THOMAS   CAKLYLE. 

actual  undeniable  achievements  as  the  proof  of  their  title  to  admira 
tion,  he  exercises  his  ingenuity  in  representing  their  greatness  under 
endless  varieties  of  striking  images;  the  hero  is  "a  flowing  light- 
fountain  of  native  original  insight,  of  manhood  and  heroic  noble- 
ness ; "  "  at  all  moments  the  Flame-image  glares  in  upon  him ; " 
"a  messenger  he,  sent  from  the  Infinite  Unknown  with  tidings 
to  us." 

Though  deficient  as  an  analyst  and  as  a  debater,  he  shows  in 
other  forms  abundance  of  the  elementary  intellectual  force  prin- 
cipally concerned  in  analysis  and  debate.  Had  his  feelings  been 
less  dominant,  he  might  have  developed  into  a  profound  professor 
of  what  he  calls  the  Dismal  Science,  and  might  even,  with  unpre- 
cedented persuasive  skill,  have  converted  the  world  to  the  practice 
of  Malthusianism.  But  feeling  and  natural  impulses  chained  his 
strong  intellect  to  their  service;  and  instead  of  scientific  analysis 
and  solid  argument,  the  result  is  a  splendour  and  originality  of 
imagery  and  dramatic  grouping  that  entitle  him  to  rank  near 
Shakspeare,  or  with  whoever  may  be  placed  next  to  our  received 
ideal  of  the  incomparable. 

A  man  of  feeling  and  impulse,  his  feelings  and  impulses  were 
very  different  from  what  we  find  in  natures  constitutionally  fitted 
for  enjoyment,  in  the  born  lovers  of  existence,  his  own  "  eupeptic  " 
men.  In  his  works  we  encounter  something  very  different  from 
Macaulay's  uniform  glow  of  buoyant  hopefulness,  hearty  belief  in 
human  progress,  and  confident  plausible  judgment  of  men  and 
events.  We  find  gloomy  views  of  man  and  his  destiny,  a  stern 
gospel  of  work,  judgments  passed  in  strong  defiance  of  conven- 
tional standards,  and  towering  egotism  under  the  mask  of  humour. 

In  another  aspect  he  strikes  us  as  offering  a  considerable  contrast 
to  De  Quincey.  The  Opium-Eater,  though  not  by  any  means  a 
eupeptic  man,  was  an  avowed  Eudsemonist,  "  hated  an  inhuman 
moralise  like  unboiled  opium,"  and  was  a  lover  of  repose  and  of 
the  softer  emotions.  In  Carlyle,  on  the  contrary,  the  central  and 
commanding  emotion  is  Power ;  he  is  all  for  excitement  and  energy. 
We  have  already  seen  the  difference  in  their  ways  of  viewing  great 
men ;  that  De  Quincey  admires  them  in  a  passive  attitude,  while 
Carlyle  is  raised  by  the  thought  of  their  achievements  to  the 
loftiest  heights  of  ideal  energy.  We  have  no  means  of  knowing 
how  Carlyle  would  have  enjoyed  the  actual  control  of  human 
beings  as  a  commander  or  a  civic  ruler — like  Cromwell,  Frede- 
rick, Mirabeau,  or  Dr  Francia;  but  he  shows  a  most  thorough 
enjoyment  of  commanding  authority  in  the  imagination.  His 
thirst  for  the  ideal  enjoyment  seem  insatiable,  and  drives  him 
to  exaggerate  the  influence  of  his  chosen  heroes,  and  to  suppress 
nnd  understate  the  influence  of  their  coadjutors.  "Universal 
History,  the  history  of  what  man  has  accomp  i.shed  in  this  world, 


CHARACTER.  139 

is  at  bottom  the  history  of  the  Great  Men  who  have  worked  there." 
"  All  things  that  we  see  standing  accomplished  in  the  world  are 
properly  the  outer  material  result,  the  practical  realisation  and 
embodiment  of  thoughts  that  dwelt  in  the  Great  Men  sent  into 
the  world  :  the  soul  of  the  whole  world's  history,  it  may  justly  be 
considered,  were  the  history  of  these." 

A  good  way  of  representing  the  difference  between  two  such 
writers  is  to  look  through  their  works,  and  piece  together  their 
conceptions  of  the  universe  in  their  highest  moods  of  sublimity. 
De  Quincey  sees  midsummer  moving  over  the  heavens  like  an 
army  with  banners ;  hears  cathedral  music  in  the  confused  noise 
of  mountain-streams ;  loves  to  contemplate  calmly  in  the  mirror 
of  such  minds  as  "Walking  Stewart's"  the  whole  mighty  vision  of 
the  sentient  universe,  oriental  pageantry,  revolutionary  convul- 
sions, civic  splendour ;  and  occasionally  lifts  his  mind  to  travel  in 
the  same  calm  way  through  the  illimitable  grandeurs  of  astronomi- 
cal spaces.  Contrast  this  repose  of  attitude  with  the  violent  ex- 
citement of  Carlyle's  favourite  conceptions  :  the  world  pictured  as 
a  dark  simmering  pit  of  Tophet,  wild  puddle  of  muddy  infatua 
tions,  of  irreconcilable  incoherences,  bottomless  universal  hypoc- 
risies, an  ungenuine  phantasmagory  of  a  world,  full  of  screechings 
and  gibberings,  of  foul  ravening  monsters,  of  meteor-lights  and 
Bacchic  dances,  the  wild  universe  storming  in  upon  man  infinite 
vague-menacing. 

Carlyle's  love  of  powerful  excitement  finds  a  magnificent  outlet 
in  his  humour  and  derision.  Psychologists  tell  us  that  the  basis 
of  laughter  is  a  sudden  accession  of  pleasure  in  the  shape  of  the 
special  elation  of  power  and  superiority.  Carlyle  avowedly  ap- 
proves of  laughter — sets  up  hearty  laughter  as  a  criterion  of 
genuine  human  worth ;  and,  as  we  shall  see  when  we  come  to 
his  qualities  of  style,  he  is  self-indulgent,  if  not  intemperate,  in 
the  exercise  of  his  own  sense  of  the  ludicrous.  His  mirth  is  robust 
— as  he  says  himself,  in  describing  the  Norsemen,  "  a  great  broad 
Brobdingnag  grin  of  true  humour." 

His  pathos  is  of  the  kind  that  goes  naturally  with  such  excessive 
indulgence  in  the  excitement  of  power.  Wherever  there  is  a  height 
there  is  a  corresponding  hollow ;  the  lover  of  intoxicating  excite- 
ment too  surely  pays  the  penalty  in  intervals  of  exhaustion,  of 
unutterable  depression  and  despondency.  With  all  his  fire,  his 
gospel  of  work,  and  his  denunciation  of  unproductive  sentimen- 
tality, Carlyle  has  his  inevitable  fits  of  the  melting  mood.  We 
shall  see  that  at  times  he  is  overpowered  with  sadness  at  the 
thought  of  human  miseries  and  perplexities,  and  that  he  bemoans 
with  more  than  Byronic  despondency  the  irresistible  movement  of 
time. 

We  have  already  spoken  of  the  amount  of  intellectual  effort 


140  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

spent  upon  the  production  of  our  author's  books.  The  grand  duty 
of  work  that  he  preaches  with  such  earnestness  he  was  no  less 
earnest  in  performing.  He  gathered  his  materials  not  only  with 
painful  labour,  but  with  scrupulous  respect  for  minute  fact.  This 
for  him  was  but  a  small  part  of  the  toil  of  writing  history  ;  when 
the  materials  were  collected,  a  much  larger  draught  of  his  impa- 
tient energy  was  spent  in  filling  the  dry  facts  with  human  interest. 
The  mere  writing  was  never  an  easy  or  happy  task  for  him :  he 
wrote  at  white  heat,  with  feverish  effort,  with  all  his  faculties 
intensely  concentrated.  If  we  take  any  page  of  his  '  French 
Revolution '  and  try  to  conceive  how  it  was  built  up,  and  what 
care  was  expended  on  the  separate  elements  of  it  before  the 
whole  waa  "  flung  out  of  him,"  as  he  said,  in  the  final  convulsive 
effort  of  composition,  we  come  as  near  as  we  can  to  realising 
what  labour  went  to  the  making  of  Carlyle's  books. 

He  does  not  seem  to  have  done  his  work  with  the  fitful  irreg- 
ularity of  Christopher  North,  but  rather  to  have  acted  on  the 
Virgilian  plan  of  so  much  manuscript  each  day.  Such  work  as 
his  could  hardly  have  been  accomplished  without  the  steadiest 
concentration  of  endeavour.  It  is  known  that  in  composing  the 
'  French  Revolution '  he  set  himself  daily  to  produce  so  much,  and 
in  all  probability  be  composed  his  other  works  on  the  same  rigid 
method.  In  this  respect  he  is  a  much  safer  model  to  the  general 
run  of  students  than  the  versatile  and  discursive  Macaulay. 

OPINIONS. — Carlyle's  doctrines  are  the  first  suggestions  of  an 
earnest  man,  adhered  to  with  unreasoning  tenacity.  As  a  rule, 
with  no  exception  that  is  worth  naming,  they  take  account  mainly 
of  one  side  of  a  case.  He  was  too  impatient  of  difficulties,  and 
had  too  little  respect  for  the  wisdom  and  experience  of  others,  to 
submit  to  be  corrected;  opposition  rather  confirmed  him  in  his 
own  opinion.  Most  of  his  practical  suggestions  had  already  been 
tried  and  found  wanting,  or  had  been  made  before  and  judged  im- 
practicable upon  grounds  that  he  did  not  or  would  not  understand. 
His  modes  of  dealing  with  pauperism  and  crime  were  in  full  opera- 
tion under  the  despotisms  of  Henry  VII.  and  Henry  VIIL  His 
theory  of  a  hero-king,  which  means  in  practice  an  accidentally 
good  and  able  man  in  a  series  of  indifferent  or  bad  despots,  has 
been  more  frequently  tried  than  any  other  political  system :  Asia 
at  this  moment  contains  no  government  that  is  not  despotic.  His 
views  in  other  departments  of  knowledge  also,  are  chiefly  deter- 
mined by  the  strength  of  unreasoning  impulses. 

This  will  appear  when  we  state  his  opinions  in  some  detail  We 
throw  them  for  convenience  into  a  few  familiar  divisions. 

Psychology. — He  disclaims  the  ordinary  mental  analysis.  He 
speaks  with  great  con  tempt  of  "  motive-grinding."  He  sat  through 


OPINIONS.  141 

Thomas  Brown's  lectures  with  perpetual  inward  protest,  declaring 
that  he  did  not  want  the  mind  to  be  taken  to  pieces  in  that  way. 

We  need  not  therefore  look  in  his  writings  for  any  large  \iews 
of  the  mind,  for  any  enunciation  of  doctrines  of  a  comprehensive 
kind.  In  his  partiality  for  everything  German,  he  adopts  with 
unquestioning  faith  some  Kantian  and  other  transcendentalisms 
of  German  origin.  His  own  original  views  of  the  mind  are  frag- 
mentary and  somewhat  fanciful 

We  may  apply  the  title  "  Psychological  "  to  some  of  his  doc- 
trines about  the  indissoluble  union  of  certain  qualities.  For  one 
example,  take  his  theory  of  Laughter  as  the  criterion  of  goodness. 
"  Readers,"  he  says,  "  who  have  any  tincture  of  Psychology,  know 
.  .  .  that  no  man  who  has  once  heartily  and  wholly  laughed 
can  be  altogether  irreclaimably  bad."  Again,  "  Laughter,  also,  if 
it  come  from  the  heart,  is  a  heavenly  thing."  As  another  example, 
take  his  doctrine  that  Intellect  is  the  true  measure  of  worth. 
"  Human  Intellect,  if  you  consider  it  well,  is  the  exact  summary 
of  Human  Worth."  "  A  man  of  intellect,  of  real  and  not  sham 
intellect,  is  by  the  nature  of  him  likewise  inevitably  a  man  of 
nobleness."  "  The  able  man  is  definable  as  the  born  enemy  of 
Falsity  and  Anarchy  and  the  born  soldier  of  Truth  and  Order.'** 

Such  doctrines  are,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  say,  far  from  clear. 
Very  bad  men  often  laugh  heartily  enough,  in  the  ordinary  sense 
of  the  words;  and  very  able  men,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the 
word  "able,"  are  often  very  great  scoundrels.  Carlyle's  unre- 
served admirers  probably  bring  themselves  to  accept  such  dogmas 
by  laying  stress  on  the  saving  clauses, — "  if  it  comes  from  the 
heart;"  "if  you  consider  it  well;"  and  suchlike.  But  none  of 
these  clauses  will  save  the  doctrines  if  they  are  taken  in  the  ordi- 
nary meaning  of  their  words ;  and  one  may  well  doubt  whether 
great  writers  are  to  be  allowed  the  privilege  of  throwing  the 
ancient  boundaries  of  words  into  confusion. 

Other  examples  of  his  habit  of  attaching  laudatory  predicates  to 
what  he  has  a  liking  for,  without  much  regard  to  the  fitness  of  the 
application,  are  such  as  the  following :  "  All  deep  things  are  song. 
It  seems  somehow  the  very  central  essence  of  us,  Song ;  as  if  all 
the  rest  were  but  wrappings  and  hulls  ;"  "  You  may  see  how  a 
man  would  fight  by  the  way  in  which  he  sings;"  "'The  imagi- 
nation that  shudders  at  the  hell  of  Dante,'  is  not  that  the  same 
faculty,  weaker  in  degree,  as  Dante's  own  1 "  "  Your  genuine 
poet  is  the  real  Encyclopedist,"  <fec.  <fec.  All  these  involve  indif- 
ferent psychology,  and  they  are  but  samples  of  more  of  the  same 
kind. 

Ethics. — Doctrines  in  Ethics  we  shall  keep  as  far  as  possible  dis- 
tinct from  doctrines  in  Theology ;  although  many  of  our  author's 
doctrines  are  two-sided. 


142  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

(i.)  According  to  Carlyle,  the  chief  end  of  life  is  the  perform- 
ance of  Duty.  He  is  full  of  contempt  for  the  pursuit  of  happiness, 
and  pours  out  his  most  indignant  eloquence  against  the  theory  of 
life  that  would  make  happiness  the  end.  "In  all  situations  out  of 
the  Pit  of  Tophet,  wherein  a  living  man  has  stood  or  can  stand, 
there  is  actually  a  prize  of  quite  infinite  value  placed  within  his 
reach — namely,  a  Duty  for  him  to  do  :  this  highest  Gospel  .  .  . 
forms  the  basis  and  worth  of  all  other  Gospels  whatsoever." 

His  stern  creed  allows  no  collateral  support  to  the  discharge  of 
duty.  If  men  labour  in  hope  of  reward,  they  are  still  unconverted, 
still  in  darkness.  They  must  recognise  that  they  deserve  nothing. 
To  Methodism,  "  with  its  eye  for  ever  turned  on  its  own  navel," 
and  torturing  itself  with  the  questions — '  Am  I  right,  am  I  wrong  1 
Shall  I  be  saved,  shall  I  be  damned  ? ' — he  gives  the  lofty  advice — 
"  If  thou  be  a  man,  reconcile  thyself  "  to  the  fact  "  that  thou  art 
wrong  ;  thou  art  like  to  be  damned;"  "then  first  is  the  devouring 
Universe  subdued  under  thee,"  and  there  breaks  upon  thee  "dawn 
as  of  an  everlasting  morning."  On  the  same  principle  of  acknow- 
ledging utter  worthlessness,  and  recognising  that  nothing  too  bad 
can  befall  us,  we  are  advised — "  Fancy  that  thou  deservest  to  be 
hanged  (as  is  most  likely),  thou  wilt  feel  it  happiness  to  'be  only 
shot ;  fancy  that  thou  deservest  to  be  hanged  in  a  hair-halter,  it 
will  be  a  luxury  to  die  in  hemp."  In  short,  our  only  consolation 
in  life  is  to  be  the  sense  of  doing  our  duty ;  as  regards  everything 
else,  we  must  expect  nothing,  lest  we  should  be  disappointed. 

(2.)  But  Duty  is  an  abstraction,  an  empty  Ideal :  does  Carlyle 
recommend  any  duties  in  particular  ?  Yes. 

The  first  great  duty  is  the  duty  of  Work — Action,  Activity. 
This  eminent  feature  in  his  preaching  has  been  called  "The 
Gospel  of  Labour."  According  to  this  gospel,  all  the  "peopled, 
clothed,  articulate  -  speaking,  high  -  towered,  wide  -  acred  World  " 
has  been  "  made  a  world  for  us  "  by  work ;  the  individual  that 
does  not  lend  a  hand  fails  in  his  duty  as  a  denizen  of  the 
Universe.  Man's  greatest  enemy  is  Disorder  ;  his  most  im- 
perative and  crying  duty  is  to  subdue  disorder,  convert  chaos 
into  order  and  method  ;  the  able  -  bodied  or  able  -  minded  man 
that  stands  idle  deserves  unspeakable  contempt, — he  is  a  dastard, 
a  fool,  a  simulacrum;  he  does  not  fulfil  his  destiny  as  a  man. 
Wherefore,  "  Do  thy  little  stroke  of  work ;  this  is  Nature's  voice, 
and  the  sum  of  all  the  commandments,  to  each  man." 

To  the  question,  What  is  to  be  done  ?  he  answers  peremptorily, 
" '  Do  the  Duty  which  lies  nearest  thee,'  which  thou  knowest  to 
be  a  duty."  "Produce!  Produce!  Were  it  but  the  pitifullest 
infinitesimal  fraction  of  a  Product,  produce  it  in  God's  name. 
Whatsoever  thy  hand  findeth  to  do,  do  it  with  thy 
might."  He  never  recommends  or  brings  prominently  forward 


OPINIONS.  143 

caie  in  the  choice  of  a  vocation;  he  is  so  eager  and  impetuous 
to  have  something  done,  that  he  has  no  thought  of  cautioning 
against  the  hasty  adoption  of  unsuitable  work.  He  evidently 
considers  there  is  much  more  danger  in  idleness.  We  must  "  live 
and  not  lie  sleeping  while  it  is  called  to-day."  "  Something 
must  be  done,  and  soon."  Doubt  is  removed  only  by  activity. 

He  upholds  the  dignity  of  work  at  all  points.  "All  true  work 
is  religion."  "  '  Laborare  est  orare' — work  is  worship."  Tlx> 
"  Captains  of  Industry  "  are  the  true  aristocracy.  The  great  army 
of  workers,  "Ploughers,  Spinners,  Builders;  Prophets,  Poets, 
Kings  ;  Brindleys  and  Goethes,  Odins  and  Arkwrights  ; " — this 
grand  host  is  "  noble,  every  soldier  in  it ;  sacred,  and  alone 
noble."  "Two  men  he  honours,  and  no  third" — "the  toilworn 
Craftsman  who  conquers  the  x  Earth,"  and  "  him  who  is  seen 
toiling  for  the  spiritually  indispensable." 

He  sets  off  his  own  Gospel  of  Work  against  other  pretended 
Gospels.  He  despatches  the  Stoics  in  the  person  of  Epictetus 
by  telling  them  that  "  the  end  of  man  is  an  Action  and  not  a 
Thought,  though  it  were  the  noblest."  He  taunts  those  that 
make  happiness  the  end  of  life  with  the  declaration,  that  "  the 
night  once  come,  our  unhappiness,  our  happiness  —  it  is  all 
abolished ;  vanished,  clean  gone ;  a  thing  that  has  been."  "  But 
our  work — behold,  that  is  not  abolished,  that  has  not  vanished : 
our  work,  behold,  it  remains,  or  the  want  of  it  remains ; — for 
endless  Times  and  Eternities,  remains."  He  is  also  vigorous 
against  what  he  calls  sentimeutalism,  which  he  dubs  "  twin- 
sister  to  Cant"  "The  barrenest  of  all  mortals  is  the  senti- 
mentalist ; "  "  in  the  shape  of  work  he  can  do  nothing." 

Another  great  duty  is  the  duty  of  Obedience.  Not  only  is 
obeying  the  best  discipline  for  governing,  and  as  such  extolled 
in  Abbot  Samson,  and  recommended  to  the  Duke  of  Logwood, 
but  "  Obedience  is  our  universal  duty  and  destiny ;  wherein 
whoso  will  not  bend  must  break."  Too  early  and  too  thoroughly 
we  cannot  be  trained  to  know  that  "  Would  in  this  world  of  ours 
is  as  mere  zero  to  Should."  Again  to  the  same  effect — "  Obedi- 
ence is  the  primary  duty  of  man.  No  man  but  is  bound  inde- 
feasibly  with  all  force  of  obligation  to  obey." 

There  is  nothing  peculiar  upon  the  face  of  these  precepts,  except 
their  strength ;  they  might  almost  stand  in  the  Institutions  of  the 
Jesuits.  Here  and  there  throughout  his  works  we  meet  with 
qualifications.  He  denounces  the  obedience  of  the  Jesuits— 
"  Obedience  to  what  is  wrong  and  false  1 — good  heavens !  there 
is  no  name  for  such  a  depth  of  human  cowardice  and  calamity." 
It  is  the  heroic,  the  divine,  the  true,  that  he  would  have  us 
obey.  When  the  powers  set  over  us  are  no  longer  anything 
divine,  resistance  becomes  a  deeper  law  of  order  than  obedience 


144  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

If  we  ask  how  we  are  to  know  the  heroic,  the  divine,  we  are 
left  to  understand  that  it  will  make  itself  manifest.  The  true 
King  "  carries  in  him  an  authority  from  God,  or  man  will  never 
give  it  him."  "He  who  is  to  be  my  Ruler,  whose  will  is  to 
be  higher  than  my  will,  was  chosen  for  me  in  heaven." 

Another  duty  is  the  duty  of  Veracity,  of  Sincerity  as  opposed 
to  Cant,  the  duty  of  being  Real  and  not  a  Sham.  On  these 
virtues  and  their  opposites,  on  those  that  observe  them  and  those 
that  violate  them,  he  expends  much  eloquenca  The  '  French 
Revolution'  is  almost  a  continued  sermon  on  the  evils  of  in- 
sincerity, hollowness,  quackery,  and  on  the  good  of  the  corre- 
sponding virtues.  And  in  none  of  his  works  can  we  read  far 
without  encountering  some  declamation  on  Truth,  Sincerity,  Real- 
ity, Falsehood,  Cant,  Puffery,  Sham. 

On  one  point  his  preaching  of  Truth  may  mislead.  He  does 
not  seem  to  think  that  Truth  requires  a  man  to  make  a  frank 
and  open  declaration  of  his  beliefs.  For  his  own  part,  at  least, 
he  is  very  reticent  as  to  his  real  opinions,  on  matters  of  religion 
for  instance ;  and  he  praises  Goethe's  example  of  wrapping  up 
opinions  in  mysterious  oracles.  The  fact  would  seem  to  be,  that 
all  his  requirements  of  Veracity,  Sincerity,  Reality,  are  satisfied 
by  one  thing,  the  conscientious  performance  of  one's  appointed 
work.  This,  if  we  look  beneath  the  gorgeous  verbal  opulence 
of  the  preacher,  would  seem  to  be  the  whole  duty  of  man.  If 
he  engages  to  cut  thistles,  let  him  cut  them  with  all  his  might 
If  he  engages  to  review  authors,  let  him  read  their  works  con- 
scientiously. If  he  engages  to  write  history,  let  him  diligently 
search  out  its  facts. 

His  characteristic  love  of  reality  appears  in  his  preference  of 
Fact  to  Fiction,  and  his  condemnation  of  Fine  Art  as  Dilet- 
tantism. 

Religion. — His  religious  views  are  worded  obscurely.  To  extract 
definite  opinions  from  his  vague  declamations  on  the  subject, 
would  inevitably  be  to  misrepresent  him.  He  intimated  plainly 
enough  that  he  had  departed  from  the  received  orthodoxy  of  this 
country ;  of  this  he  made  no  secret  He  himself  gave  up  study- 
ing for  the  Scottish  Church ;  and  he  records  his  opinion  "  in  flat 
reproval "  of  John  Sterling's  resolution  to  take  orders  in  the 
English  Church.  "No  man  of  Sterling's  veracity,  had  he  clearly 
consulted  his  own  heart,  or  had  his  own  heart  been  capable  of 
clearly  responding,  and  not  been  dazzled  and  bewildered  by 
transient  fantasies  and  theosophic  moonshine,  could  have  under- 
taken this  function."  Elsewhere  he  pities  Sterling  in  this  "  con- 
fused epoch  of  ours,"  with  "the  old  spiritual  highways  and  recog- 
nised paths  to  the  Eternal,  now  all  torn  up  and  flung  in  heaps, 
submerged  in  unutterable  boiliiig  mud-oceans  of  Hypocrisy  and 


OPINIONS.  145 

Unbelievability,  of  brutal  living  Atheism  and  damnable  dead 
putrescent  Cant"  But  while  he  was  thus  severe  alike  on  In 
lidelity  and  on  Orthodoxy,  he  never  said  with  an  approach 
to  intelligibility  what  was  his  own  belief.  Mr  Froude  has 
rescued  a  fragment  written  in  1852,  and  intended  to  expound 
more  fully  his  thoughts  on  religion.  But  Carlyle  had  not  gone 
far  when  he  threw  the  work  aside  as  unsatisfactory,  and  not 
adequately  expressing  his  meaning.  John  Sterling  gives  the 
following  account  of  the  Religion  or  No-Religion  of  the  Sartor : — 

"  What  we  find  everywhere,  with  an  abundant  use  of  the  name  of  God,  is 
the  conception  of  a  formless  Infinite  whether  in  time  or  space ;  of  a  high 
inscrutable  Necessity,  which  it  is  the  chief  wisdom  and  virtue  to  submit 
to,  which  is  the  mysterious  impersonal  base  of  all  Existence — shows  itself 
in  the  laws  of  every  separate  being's  nature,  and  for  mau  in  the  shape  of 
duty." 

We  may  perhaps  rank  among  his  religious  opinions  his  accept- 
ance of  Fichte's  idea  that  the  "  true  literary  man  "  is  "  the  world's 
Priest,"  "continually  unfolding  the  Godlike  to  men,"  "sent  hither 
especially  that  he  may  discern  for  himself,  and  make  manifest  to 
us,  this  same  Divine  Idea."  By  way  of  defining  the  "true"  man 
of  letters,  he  says  that  "whoever  lives  not  wholly  in  this  Divine 
Idea  is  ...  no  Literary  Man." 

1'olitics. — His  political  views  connect  themselves  partly  with  his 
ideas  about  Work,  Reality,  Sincerity,  and  suchlike ;  and  partly 
with  his  Hero-King.  All  the  miseries  in  this  life  are  due  to 
Idleness,  Imposture,  Unveracity.  This  he  explicitly  declares. 
"  Quack -ridden  ;  in  that  one  word  lies  all  misery  whatsoever. 
Speciosity  in  all  departments  usurps  the  place  of  reality,  thrusts 
reality  away.  .  .  .  The  quack  is  a  Falsehood  incarnate." 
He  does  indeed  say  elsewhere  that  "it  is  the  feeling  of  injus- 
tice that  is  insupportable  to  all  men ; "  but  then  he  explains 
that  injustice  "  is  another  name  for  disorder,  for  unveracity, 
unreality."  This  being  so,  what  does  he  propose  as  remedies 
for  imposture,  unreality,  <fec.  1  We  come  upon  two  specific  reme- 
dies hidden  away  under  masses  of  declamation — emigration  and 
education  :  emigration — to  provide  work  for  industrious  men  that 
can  get  no  employment;  education — for  no  stated  reason.  He 
simply  recommends  that  "  the  mystery  of  alphabetic  letter  should 
l>e  imparted  to  all  human  souls  in  this  realm."  These  are  his 
only  constructive  views  in  politics,  and  they  can  hardly  be  said 
to  be  his.1  For  the  rest,  through  his  'Chartism,'  'Past  and  Pres- 
ent,' '  Latter-Day  Pamphlets,'  and  incidentally  through  his  other 

1  Carlyle's  chief  plans  for  social  reform  were  anticipated  with  great  exactness 
in  Sir  Thomas  Moore's  '  Utopia '  (see  p.  191).  In  my  '  Characteristics  of  English 
Poets'  (p.  51,  zd.  ed.),  T  have  pointed  out  the  close  correspondence  between  the 
social  doctrines  of  Carlyle  and  the  autlior  ot  '  Piers  the  Plowman.' 

K 


146  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

works,  ho  deplores  the  present  state  of  things,  denounces  existing 
Kings,  Aristocracies,  Churches,  and  specially  declaims  against 
modern  political  movements.  We  did  wrong  to  emancipate  the 
negroes ;  they  find  the  necessaries  of  life  cheap,  work  little,  and 
let  the  sugar  crops  rot.  We  are  too  lenient  with  our  criminals 
(see  p.  158).  He  would  take  more  work  out  of  them.  He 
ci  insiders  the  transaction  of  Government  business  to  be  in  a 
wretched  state — hampered  by  "  blind  obstructions,  fatal  indol- 
ences, pedantries,  stupidities;"  the  Colonial  Office  "a  world-wide 
jungle  of  red-tape,  inhabited  by  doleful  creatures."  He  would 
have  none  but  men  of  ability  in  important  posts.  He  dis- 
approves strongly  of  Parliaments  elected  by  the  people ;  sneers 
at  voting  and  "  ballot-boxes " ;  asks  whether  a  crew  that  settled 
every  movement  by  voting  would  be  likely  to  take  a  ship  round 
Cape  Horn.  His  ideal  of  government  is  to  have  a  king  (which 
he  is  constantly  deriving  from  Can  through  Konig,  and  constantly 
translating  "  Ableman ")  at  the  head  of  affairs,  and  capable, 
obedient  officials  under  him  through  all  degrees  of  importance. 
How  to  realise  the  ideal  he  does  not  show ;  and,  as  we  have  said, 
he  takes  no  account  of  the  endeavours  of  human  communities 
towards  this  ideal,  or  of  the  uncontrollable  forces  that  make  it  an 
impossibility. 

Criticism. — Of  literary  criticism  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the 
word — in  the  sense  of  noting  faults  and  merits  of  style,  of  showing 
what  to  avoid  and  what  to  imitate — Carlyle's  writings  contain 
next  to  nothing.  He  published,  as  we  have  seen,  under  the  title 
of  '  Critical  and  Miscellaneous  Essays,'  remarks  on  various  great 
men  of  letters — German,  French,  and  English.  But  in  these 
essays  he  does  not  occupy  himself  with  style,  or  with  the  state- 
ment and  illustration  of  critical  canons.  He  deals  rather  with 
life,  character,  and  opinions ;  declaims  on  his  favourite  topics — 
Mystery,  Reverence,  Industry,  Veracity ;  rails  at  reviewers,  logi- 
cians, historical  philosophers,  sceptical  philosophers,  atheists,  and 
other  favourite  objects  of  aversion.  He  ranks  authors,  not  accord- 
ing to  their  literary  power,  but  according  as  they  possess  his  car- 
dinal virtues.  Goethe  and  Johnson  he  extols  above  measure  as 
being  men  of  power,  and,  at  the  same  time,  industrious,  veracious, 
and  reverential  towards  the  mystery  of  the  world.  In  consideration 
of  this  he  passes  over  in  Goethe  some  minor  iniquities  that  else- 
where he  condemns  in  the  abstract,  and  passes  over  in  Johnson 
what  some  writers  are  pleased  to  call  his  intolerant  prejudices  and 
narrow  canons  of  criticism.  Voltaire  and  Diderot  he  finds  indus- 
trious and  veracious,  but  terribly  wanting  in  reverence.  Accord- 
ingly, he  refuses  to  call  them  great  men — finds  in  Voltaire  adroit- 
ness rather  than  greatness,  and  styles  him  a  master  of  persiflage. 

One  or  two  of  his  precepts  may  be  called  literary,  though  they 


VOCABULARY.  147 

scarcely  belong  to  minute  criticism.  He  warns  writers  to  beware 
of  affectation  ;  to  study  reality  in  their  style.  One  of  the  chief 
merits  of  Burns  is  his  "  indisputable  air  of  reality."  He  further 
recommends  them  to  write  slowly;  points  out  tlie  evils  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  extempore  speed,  and  affirms  that  no  great  tiling 
was  ever  done  without  difficulty.  Once  more  he  stands  up  for  a 
style  that  does  not  show  its  meaning  at  once,  that  becomes  intel- 
ligible slowly  and  after  much  laborious  study.  ( )n  this  ground 
he  praises  Goethe  and  Novalis,  saying  that  no  good  book  or  good 
thing  of  any  sort  shows  itself  at  first.  Still  another  literary  notion, 
already  alluded  to,  is  his  idea  that,  in  the  present  day,  men  should 
write  prose  and  not  poetry,  and  history  rather  than  fiction. 


ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. 

His  command  of  words  must  be  pronounced  to  be  of  the  highest 
order.  Among  the  few  that  stand  next  to  Shakspeare  he  occupies 
a  very  high  place. 

As  his  peculiar  feelings  are  strongly  marked,  so  are  the  special 
regions  of  his  verbal  copiousness.  As  a  matter  of  course,  he  was 
specially  awake  to,  and  specially  retained,  expressions  suiting  his 
peculiar  vein  of  strength,  rugged  sublimity,  and  every  form  of 
ridicule  and  contempt  down  to  the  lowest  tolerable  depths  of 
coarseness.  It  would  be  interesting  to  collect  the  various  forms 
that  he  uses  to  express  his  sense  of  the  confusion,  the  chaotic  dis- 
order, of  these  latter  days.  An  estimate  of  his  abundance  on  that 
or  any  other  of  his  favourite  topics  would  give  the  reader  the  most 
vivid  idea  of  his  lingual  resources. 

Having  a  strong  natural  bent  for  the  study  of  character,  he  is  a 
consummate  master  of  the  requisite  phraseology.  In  the  language 
needful  for  describing  character,  he  probably  comes  nearer  Shak- 
speare than  any  other  of  our  great  writers.  To  be  convinced  of 
this,  we  have  only  to  look  at  his  opulence  in  bringing  out  the  leading 
features  of  such  a  man  as  John  Sterling.  Between  the  subjective 
and  the  objective  side,  the  language  of  feeling  and  the  language  of 
gesture  and  action,  he  is  pretty  evenly  divided — a  master  of  both 
vocabularies. 

In  the  use  of  Latinised  terms,  as  against  Saxon,  he  follows  the 
Shakspearian  type  of  an  indifferent  mixture.  He  does  not  particu- 
larly affect  either  extreme.  Often  on  themes  where  other  writers 
would  use  solemn  words  of  Latin  origin,  he-  prefers  what  Leigh 
Hunt  calls  a  "noble  simplicity,"  which  others  might  call  "profane 
familiarity " ;  but  he  employs  liberally  the  Latinised  vocabulary 
when  it  suits  his  purpose.  His  acquaintance  with  technical  namea 


148  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

is  considerable.  He  makes  frequent  metaphorical  and  literal  ap- 
plication of  the  language  of  mathematics  and  natural  philosophy 
— his  favourite  studies  when  a  young  man.  He  knew  also  the 
vocabulary  of  several  industries,  as  well  as  of  the  social  mechanism 
and  institutions. 

Two  circumstances  in  particular  make  his  command  of  acknow- 
ledged English  appear  less  than  it  really  is.  First,  revelling  in  his 
immense  force  of  Comparison  or  Assimilation,  he  shows  a  prodigi- 
ous luxuriance  of  the  figures  of  similarity — nicknaming  personages, 
applying  old  terms  to  new  situations,  and  suchlike.  He  often 
substitutes  metaphorical  for  real  names  when  the  real  are  quite 
sufficient,  and  perhaps  more  suitable  for  the  occasion.  Now  this 
habit,  not  to  speak  of  its  lowering  the  value  and  freshness  of  his 
genius  by  over-doing  and  over-affecting  originality  of  phrase,  often 
makes  it  appear  as  if  he  did  not  know  the  literal  and  customary 
names  of  things,  and  were  driven  to  make  shift  with  these  allusive 
names.  Another  circumstance  produces  the  same  impression.  He 
is  most  liberal  in  his  coinage  of  new  words,  and  even  new  forms  of 
syntax.  For  this  he  was  taken  to  task  by  his  friend  John  Sterling,1 
part  of  whose  criticism  we  quote  : — 

"  A  good  deal  of  the  language  is  positively  barbarous.  '  En- 
'  vironment,'  '  vestural,'  '  stertorous,'  '  visualised,'  •'  complected,' 
1  and  others  I  think  to  be  found  in  the  first  thirty  pages,  are 
'  words,  so  far  as  I  know,  without  any  authority ;  some  of  them 
'  contrary  to  analogy ;  and  none  repaying  by  their  value  the  dis- 
'  advantage  of  novelty.  To  these  must  be  added  new  and  errone- 
'  ous  locutions  :  '  whole  other  tissues  '  for  all  the  other,  and  similar 
'  uses  of  the  word  whole  ;  '  orients  '  for  pearls  ;  '  lucid  '  and 
1 '  lucent '  employed  as  if  they  were  different  in  meaning ;  '  hulls ' 
'perpetually  for  coverings,  it  being  a  word  hardly  used,  and  then 
'  only  for  the  husk  of  a  nut ;  '  to  insure  a  man  of  misapprehension;' 
"talented,1  a  mere  newspaper  and  hustings  word,  invented,  I  be- 
'lieve,  by  O'Connell.  I  must  also  mention  the  constant  recur- 
'rence  of  some  words  in  a  quaint  and  queer  connection,  which 
'gives  a  grotesque  and  somewhat  repulsive  mannerism  to  many 
'sentences.  Of  these  the  commonest  offender  is  'quite';  which 
'appears  in  almost  every  page,  and  gives  at  first  a  droll  kind  of 
'emphasis;  but  soon  becomes  wearisome.  'Nay,'  'manifold,' 
'  'cunning  enough  significance,'  'faculty'  (meaning  a  man's  rational 
'or  moral  power),  'special,'  'not  without,'  haunt  the  reader  as  if 
'in  some  uneasy  dream,  which  does  not  rise  to  the  dignity  of 
nightmare." 

In  this  passage,  which  Carlyle  himself  has  given  to  the  world, 
some  of  his  most  striking  peculiarities  of  diction  are  noticed.     To 
give  an  adequate  view  of  his  verbal  eccentricities,  would  be  no 
1  Carlyle's  Life  of  Sterling,  276. 


SENTENCES.  149 

small  labour.  He  extends  the  admitted  licences  of  the  language 
in  every  direction,  using  one  part  of  speech  for  another,  verbs  for 
nouns,  nouns  for  verbs,  adverbs  and  adjectives  for  nouns.  His 
coinages  often  take  the  form  of  new  derivatives — "  benthamee," 
"amusea"  He  abuses  the  licence  of  giving  plurals  to  abstract 
nouns  :  thus  "  credibilities,"  "  moralities,"  "  theological  philoso- 
phies," "transcendentalisms  and  theologies." 

This  excess  of  metaphors,  new  words,  and  grammatical  licencea 
is  in  favour  of  the  reader's  enjoyment,  but  not  so  much  in  favour 
of  the  student's  instruction.  It  belongs  to  the  inimitable,  unre- 
producible  part  of  the  style ;  the  student  cannot  take  the  same 
liberties  without  bearing  the  charge  of  copying  an  individual 
manner,  instead  of  deriving  from  the  common  fund  of  the  language. 
So  far  it  may  stimulate  to  do  likewise  in  one's  own  independent 
sphere ;  but  close  imitation  is  little  better  than  parody,  and  imi- 
tation of  any  kind  runs  some  danger  of  ridicule. 

Sentences. 

In  his  essays,  particularly  in  the  earlier  essays  and  in  his  '  Life 
of  Schiller,'  Carlyle  shows  none  of  the  irregularity  of  structure 
that  appears  in  his  matured  style.  He  has  an  admirable  com- 
mand of  ordinary  English,  and  constructs  his  sentences  to  suit  the 
motion  of  a  massive  and  rugged,  yet  musical  rhythm. 

Even  in  his  essays,  though  himself  writing  with  great  care,  he 
speaks  slightingly  of  painstaking  in  the  structure  of  sentences. 
What  he  really  objects  to  is  making  sentences  after  an  artificial 
model,  of  a  particular  length,  or  with  a  particular  cadence,  or  with 
a  particular  number  of  members  ;  but  he  speaks  as  if  he  condemned 
all  labour  in  the  arrangement  of  words,  and  lays  himself  open  to 
be  quoted  by  any  that  would  shirk  the  trouble  of  making  them- 
selves as  intelligible  as  possible  to  their  readers. 

The  sentences  of  his  later  manner  we  can  describe  in  his  own 
•words.  Among  his  editorial  remarks  on  the  style  of  Teufelsdroeckh 
is  the  following : — 

"Of  his  sentences  perhaps  not  more  than  nine-tenths  stand  straight  on 
their  legs  ;  the  remainder  are  in  quite  angular  attitudes,  buttressed  up  by 
props  (of  parentheses  and  dashes),  and  ever  with  this  or  the  other  tag-rag 
hanging  from  them ;  a  few  even  sprawl  out  helplessly  on  all  sides,  quite 
brokeu-backed  and  dismembered." 

From  this  figurative  description  one  would  suppose  his  sentences 
to  be  extremely  involved  and  complicated.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
they  are  extremely  simple  in  construction  —  consisting,  for  the 
most  part,  of  two  or  three  co-ordinate  statements,  or  of  a  short 
direct  statement,  eked  out  by  explanatory  clauses  either  in  apposi- 
tion or  in  the  "  nominative  absolute  "  construction.  These  apposi- 


150  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

tion  and  absolute  clauses  are  the  "  tag-rags,"  and  it  is  in  the  con- 
nection of  them  with  the  main  statement  that  we  find  the  "  dashes 
and  parentheses."  This  character  of  his  sentences  is  so  obvious 
that  few  examples  will  suffice  : — 

' '  Whatsoever  sensibly  exists,  whatsoever  represents  Spirit  to  Spirit,  is  pro- 
perly a  Clothing,  a  suit  of  Raiment,  put  on  for  a  season  and  to  be  laid  oft 
Thus  in  this  one  pregnant  subject  of  CLOTHES,  rightly  understood,  is  in- 
cluded all  that  men  have  thought,  dreamed,  done,  and  been :  the  whole 
External  Universe  and  what  it  holds  is  but  Clothing  ;  and  the  essence  of  all 
Science  lies  in  the  PHILOSOPHY  OF  CLOTHES." 

In  this  explanation  of  the  Philosophy  of  Clothes,  the  sentences 
are  free  from  intricacy.  The  second  sentence  exemplifies  a  very 
common  form  with  Carlyle  in  his  less  irregular  moods,  although  he 
sneers  at  some  sentence- makers  because  they  are  very  curious  to 
have  their  sentence  consist  of  three  members ;  yet  he  seems  to 
have  been  himself  a  lover  of  this  peculiar  cadence. 

He  very  often  uses  the  sentence  of  two  members,  one  explana- 
tory of  the  other — avoiding  the  error  of  joining  them  by  a  con- 
junction. Thus  in  his  description  of  John  Sterling's  mother : — 

"The  mother  was  a  woman  yf  many  household  virtues  ;  to  a  warm  affec- 
tion for  her  children,  she  joined  a  degree  of  taste  and  intelligence  which  is 
of  much  rarer  occurrence." 

As  examples  of  his  practice  of  apposition,  take  the  following : — 

"Biography  is  by  nature  the  most  universally  profitable,  universally 
pleasant  of  all  things  :  especially  Biography  of  distinguished  individuals." 

Speaking  of  John  Sterling,  he  says  : — 

"  To  the  like  effect  shone  something,  a  kind  of  childlike,  half-embarrassed 
shimmer  of  expression,  on  his  fine  vivid  countenance  ;  curiously  mingling 
with  its  ardours  and  audacities." 

The  Cruwn  -  Prince's  imprisonment  by  his  father  is  thus  de- 
scribed : — 

"  Poor  Friedrich  meanwhile  has  had  a  grim  time  of  it  these  two  months 
back  ;  left  alone,  in  coarse  brown  prison  -dress,  within  his  four  bare  walls  at 
Ciistrin ;  in  uninterrupted,  unfathomable  colloquy  with  the  Destinies  and 
the  Necessities  there." 

In  the  following  long  sentence  abundant  use  is  made  both  of 
participle  and  of  nominative  absolute  : — 

"  Eminent  swill  of  drinking,  with  the  loud  coarse  talk  supposable,  on  the 
part  of  Mentzel  and  consorts,  did  go  on,  in  this  manner,  all  afternoon  ;  in 
the  evening  drunk  Mentzel  came  out  for  air  ^  went  strutting  and  staggering 
about ;  emerging  finally  on  the  platform  of  some  rampart,  face  of  him  huge 
and  red  as  that  of  the  foggiest  rising  Moon  ; — and  stood,  looking  over  into 
the  Lorraine  Country  ;  belching  out  a  storm  of  oaths  as  to  his  taking  it,  as 
to  his  doing  this  and  that ;  and  was  even  flourishing  his  sword  by  way  of 
accompaniment;  when,  lo,  whistling  slightly  thiough  the  summer  air,  a 


SENTENCES.  151 

rifle-ball  from  some  sentry  on  the  French  side  (writers  say,  it  was  a  French 
drummer,  grown  impatient,  and  snatching  a  sentry's  piece)  took  the  brain 
of  him  or  the  belly  of  him  :  and  he  rushed  down  at  once,  a  totally  collapsed 
monster,  and  mere  heap  of  dead  ruin,  never  to  trouble  mankind  more." 

We  have  seen  that  Macaulay's  style  may  in  an  especial  degree 
be  called  artificial,  inasmuch  as  he  makes  prodigal  use  of  special 
artifices  of  composition.  Carlyle  is  artificial  in  a  different  sense  ; 
at  least  he  uses  artifices  of  a  different  kind.  His  structure  of 
sentence  is  extremely  loose — is  an  extravagant  antithesis  to  the 
period'  3.  His  studied  ruggedness  and  careless  cumulative  method 
are  incompatible  with  measured  balance  of  clause  or  sentence.  We 
may  say,  with  a  rough  approximation  to  truth,  that  Macaulay's 
artificiality  lies  in  departing  from  ordinary  colloquial  structure, 
Carlyle's  in  departing  from  the  ordinary  structure  of  written  com- 
position. 

In  his  '  Life  of  Schiller,'  and  in  his  earlier  essays,  Carlyle  builds 
up  his  composition  with  elaborate  care  in  the  ordinary  literary  forms. 
The  following  periodic  sentences  are  constructed  with  Johnsonian 
formality,  and  with  more  than  Johnsonian  elaboration : — 

"Could  ambition  always  choose  its  own  path,  and  were  will  in  1  in  man 
imdertakings  always  synonymous  with  faculty,  all  truly  ambitious  men 
would  be  men  of  letters.  Certainly,  if  we  examine  that  love  of  power, 
which  enters  so  largely  into  most  practical  calculations — nay,  which  out 
Utilitarian  friends  have  recognised  as  the  sole  end  and  origin,  both  motive 
and  reward,  of  all  earthly  enterprises,  animating  alike  the  philanthropist, 
the  conqueror,  the  money-changer,  and  the  missionary — we  shall  find  that 
all  other  arenas  of  ambition,  compared  with  this  rich  and  boundless  one  of 
Literature,  meaning  thereby  whatever  respects  the  promulgation  of  Thought, 
are  poor,  limited,  and  ineffectual.  For  dull,  unreflective,  merely  instinctive 
as  the  ordinary  man  may  seem,  he  has  nevertheless,  as  a  quite  indispensable 
appendage,  a  head  that  in  some  degree  considers  and  computes  ;  a  lamp  or 
rushlight  of  understanding  has  been  given  him,  which,  through  whatever 
dim,  besmoked,  and  strangely  diflractive  media  it  may  shine,  is  the  ultimate 
guiding  light  of  his  whole  path :  and  here  as  well  as  there,  now  as  at  all 
times  in  man's  history,  Opinion  rules  the  world." 

In  this  earlier  style  he  sometimes  also  composes  elaborate 
balanced  parallels  after  the  model  of  Pope's  comparison  between 
Homer  and  Virgil.  We  quote  a  short  comparison  between  Alfieri 
and  Schiller,  where  the  imitation  of  Pope  is  very  apparent : — 

"Alfieri  and  Schiller  were  again  unconscious  competitors  in  the  history 
of  Mary  Stuart.  But  the  works  before  us  give  a  truer  specimen  of  their 
comparative  merits.  Schiller  seems  to  have  the  greater  genius  ;  Alfieri  the 
more  commanding  character.  Alfieri's  greatness  rests  on  the  stern  concen- 
tration of  fiery  passion,  under  the  dominion  of  an  adamantine  will :  this  was 
his  own  make  of  mind  ;  and  he  represents  it  with  strokes  in  themselves  de- 
void of  charm,  but  in  their  union  terrible  as  a  prophetic  scroll.  Schiller's 
moral  force  is  commensurate  with  his  intellectual  gifts,  and  nothing  more. 
The  mind  of  the  one  is  like  the  ocean,  beautiful  in  its  strength,  smiling 
in  the  radiance  of  summer,  and  washing  luxuriant  and  romantic  shores : 


152  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

that  of  the  other  is  like  some  black  unfathomable  lake  placed  far  amid  the 
melancholy  mountains;  bleak,  solitary,  desolate;  but  girdled  with  grim 
sky-piercing  cliffs,  overshadowed  with  storms,  and  illuminated  only  by  the 
red  glare  of  the  lightning.  Schiller  is  magnificent  in  his  expansion,  Alfieri 
is  overpowering  in  his  condensed  energy  ;  the  first  inspires  us  with  greater 
admiration,  the  last  with  greater  awe." 

Paragraphs. 

In  his  more  rhapsodical  works,  such  as  'Chartism*  and  the 
'  Latter-Day  Pamphlets,'  he  is  an  indifferent  observer  of  para- 
graph method.  The  reader  is  bewildered  by  the  introduction  of 
reflections  without  any  hint  of  their  bearing  on  the  theme  in  hand. 
Some  pages  remind  us  of  his  vivid  descriptions  of  chaotic  inunda- 
tions that  hide  or  sweep  away  all  guiding-posts.  Very  seldom  can 
we  gather  from  the  beginning  of  a  paragraph  what  is  to  be  its 
purport.  No  attempt  is  made  to  keep  a  main  subject  prominent. 
Whenever  anything  occurs  to  suggest  one  of  his  favourite  themes 
of  declamation,  he  embraces  the  opportunity,  and  lets  his  main 
business  drop. 

This  applies  to  his  "prophetical"  utterances,  where  his  great 
natural  clearness  both  in  matter  and  in  manner  seems  to  be 
abandoned.  In  his  history  the  case  is  very  different  There  his 
arrangement  is  almost  the  perfection  of  clearness.  He  is  at  pains 
to  make  everything  easy  to  the  reader.  When  the  bearing  of  a 
statement  is  not  apparent,  he  is  careful  to  make  it  explicit  In 
each  paragraph  the  main  subject  is  for  the  most  part  kept  promi- 
nent,— his  defiance  of  ordinary  syntax  giving  him  great  facilities 
for  a  distinct  foreground  and  background.  He  begins  his  para- 
graphs with  some  indication  of  their  contents.  Further,  he  is 
consecutive,  and  keeps  rigidly  to  the  point. 

Figures  of  Speech. 

Teufelsdroeckh  is  made  to  say,  concerning  style,  that  plain  words 
are  the  skeleton,  and  metaphors  l  "  the  muscles  and  tissues  and 
living  integuments  ; "  further,  that  his  own  style  is  "  not  without 
an  apoplectic  tendency." 

This  might  be  quoted  against  Carlyle's  own  dictum,  that  "  genius 
is  unconscious  of  its  excellence."  His  profusion  of  figurative  lan- 
guage is  perhaps  the  most  striking  monument  of  his  originality 
and  power. 

Figures  of  Similarity. — His  similitudes,  forcibly  hunted  out  from 
every  region  of  his  knowledge  of  nature  and  of  books,  are  not 
merely  fanciful  embellishments — most  of  them  go  to  the  making 
ot  his  vivid  powers  of  description.  The  character,  or  personal 

1  Metaphor  is  here  probably  used  for  "trope,"  as  that  word  is  defined  in  the 
Introduction. 


FIGURES   OF   SPEECH.  153 

appearance,  or  action  of  an  individual ;  the  character  of  a  nation, 
a  state  of  society,  a  political  situation  ;  the  relative  position  of  two 
belligerents, — everything,  in  short,  that  needs  describing,  lie  brings 
vividly  before  us  in  its  leading  features  by  some  significant  simile 
or  metaphor. 

This  wealth  of  illustration  is  very  noticeable  in  the  description 
of  character.  For  every  personage  of  marked  character  he  exerts 
himself  to  find  a  vivid  similitude.  "  Acrid,  corrosive,  as  the  spirit 
of  sloes  and  copperas,  is  Marat,  Friend  of  the  People."  Lafayette 
is  "a  thin  constitutional  Pedant;  clear,  thin,  inflexible,  as  water 
turned  to  thin  ice,  whom  no  Queen's  heart  can  love."  The  Coun- 
tess of  Darlington,  George  L's  fat  mistress,  is  "a  cataract  of  tallow, 
with  eyebrows  like  a  cart-wheel,  and  dim  coaly  disks  for  eyes." 
She  is  contrasted  with  the  Duchess  of  Kendal,  the  lean  mistress, 
"poor  old  anatomy  or  lean  human  nailrod." 

Every  kind  of  situation,  individual  or  social,  is  set  forth  in  the 
same  way.  The  '  French  Revolution '  is  a  blazing  heap  of  simili- 
tudes ;  they  meet  us  at  every  page  in  twos  and  threes.  They  are 
often  very  homely.  The  following,  taken  at  random,  are  tolerably 
fair  specimens : — 

"Your  Revolution,  like  jelly  sufficiently  boiled,  needs  only  to  be  poured 
into  shapes  of  Constitution,  and  'consolidated'  therein." 

"  Military  France  is  everywhere  full  of  sour  inflammatory  humour,  which 
exhales  itself  fuliginously,  this  way  or  that ;  a  whole  continent  of  smoking 
flax,  which,  blown  on  here  or  there  by  any  angry  wiud,  might  so  easily  start 
into  a  blaze,  into  a  continent  of  fire." 

"Such  Patriotism  as  snarls  dangerously  and  shows  teeth,  Patrollotism. 
shall  suppress  ;  or,  far  better,  Royalty  shall  soothe  down  the  anger  of  it  by 
gentle  pattings,  and,  most  effectual  of  all,  by  fuller  diet." 

The  History  of  Friedrich  is  illuminated  no  less  effectively.  He 
speaks  incidentally  of  the  French  Revolution  as — 

"  That  whirlwind  of  the  universe — lights  obliterated — and  the  torn  wrecks 
of  Earth  and  Hell  hurled  aloft  into  the  Empyrean — black  whirlwind  which 
made  even  apes  serious,  and  drove  most  of  them  mad." 

The  above  is  a  characteristic  figure.  The  following,  along 
with  a  characteristic  similitude,  introduces  one  of  his  favourite 
personifications  : — 

' '  As  the  History  of  Friedrich,  in  this  Ciistrian  epoch,  and  indeed  in  all 
epochs  and  parts,  is  still  little  other  than  a  whirlpool  of  simmering  con- 
fusions, dust  mainly,  and  sibylline  paper-shreds,  in  the  pages  of  poor  Dryas- 
dust, perhaps  we  cannot  do  better  than  snatrh  a  shred  or  two  (of  the  partly 
legible  kind,  or  capable  of  being  made  legible)  out, of  that  hideous  caldron ; 
pin  them  down  at  their  proper  dates  ;  and  try  if  the  reader  can,  by  such 
»eans,  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  thing  with  his  own  eyes." 

His  account  of  old  Friedrich's  violence  to  young  Friedrich  upon 


154  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

the  attempted  "  desertion,"  is  a  fair  sample  of  his  figurative  man- 
ner at  its  acme : — 

"  Friedrich  Wilhelm's  conduct,  looked  at  from  without,  appears  that  of 
a  hideous  royal  ogre,  or  blind  anthropophagous  Polyphemus  fallen  mad. 
Looked  at  from  within,  where  the  Polyphemus  has  his  reasons,  and  a  kind 
of  inner  rushlight  to  enlighten  his  path,  and  is  not  bent  on  man-eating,  but 
on  discipline  in  spite  of  difficulties, — it  is  a  wild  enough  piece  of  humanity, 
not  so  much  ludicrous  as  tragical.  Never  was  a  royal  bear  so  led  about 
before  by  a  pair  of  conjuring  pipers  in  the  market,  or  brought  to  such  a  pass 
iu  his  dancing  for  them." 

Two  other  things  must  be  noticed  before  we  have  a  complete 
idea  of  his  employment  of  similitudes.  One  is  a  habit,  already 
partially  alluded  to,  of  keeping  up  descriptive  metaphors,  and 
using  them  instead  of  the  literal  names,  or  along  with  the  literal 
names  as  a  kind  of  permanent  Homeric  epithet.  Thus,  he  never 
mentions  the  Countess  of  Darlington  without  designating  her  as 
the  "  cataract  of  tallow";  or  the  Duchess  of  Kendal  without  some 
thing  equivalent  to  "  Maypole  or  lean  human  nailrod."  The  other 
noticeable  thing  is  his  frequent  repetition,  with  or  without  varia- 
tions, of  certain  favourite  figures.  Perhaps  the  most  characteristic 
is  his  stock  of  metaphors  and  similes  drawn  from  the  great  features 
of  the  material  world  to  illustrate  the  moral ;  his  "  pole-star  veiled 
by  thick  clouds,"  his  earthquakes,  mad  foam-oceans,  Noah's  deluge, 
mud-deluges,  cesspools  of  the  Universe,  Pythons,  Megatheriums, 
Chimaeras,  Dead-Sea  Apes,  and  suchlike. 

He  has  also  certain  favourite  personifications,  which  are  made  to 
do  a  great  deal  of  service.  Such  are  the  Destinies,  the  Necessities, 
the  dumb  Veracities,  the  Eternal  Voices,  Fact,  Nature,  all  which 
are  so  many  synonyms  for  the  homely  phrase,  "  circumstances 
beyond  our  control."  We  have  seen  that  when  Friedrich  was 
shut  up  alone  at  Custrin,  he  was  left  in  "  colloquy  with  the  Des- 
tinies ;md  the  Necessities  there."  In  another  passage  he  is  said 
to  be  "  shut  out  from  the  babble  of  fools,  and  conversing  only  with 
the  dumb  Veracities,  with  the  huge  inarticulate  moanings  of  Des- 
tiny, Necessity,  and  Eternity."  When  he  submits  to  his  father, 
he  is  said  to  be  "  loyal  to  Fact,"  which  means  that  he  yields  to 
what  he  cannot  overcome.  In  like  manner,  Democracy,  "  the 
grand,  alarming,  imminent,  indisputable  Reality,"  is  "  the  inevi- 
table Product  of  the  Destinies  " :  whoever  refuses  to  recognise  that 
the  Avorld  has  come  to  this,  is  "disloyal  to  Fact."  "All  thinking 
men,  and  good  citizens  of  their  country,"  "  have  an  ear  for  the 
small  still  voices  and  eternal  intimations";  in  other  words,  discern 
the  best  course  that  circumstances  will  admit  of.  "The  eternal 
regulations  of  the  Universe,"  "the  monition  of  the  gods  in  regard 
to  our  affaire,"  "  which,  if  a  man  know,  it  is  well  with  him,"  are 
other  figurative  expressions  to  the  same  effect. 


FIGURES  OF  SPEECH.  155 

One  of  Carlyle's  favourite  inferior  personages  is  Dryasdust, 
whom  we  have  already  introduced.  He  represents  any  and  every 
historian  that  takes  an  interest  in  what  our  author  finds  it  conve- 
nient to  pronounce  "dry.  "  He  is  abused  sometimes  for  knowing 
Rymer's  '  Foedera '  and  India  Bills,  sometimes  for  knowing  Court 
gossip.  He  is  one  of  Carlyle's  standing  butts. 

Figures  of  Contiguity. — If  we  apply  this  designation  to  every 
case  of  indicating  a  thing,  not  by  its  literal  name,  but  by  use  of 
expressive  parts  and  expressive  collaterals,  Carlyle  luxuriates  in 
such  figures  as  much  as  in  figures  of  similarity. 

To  take  an  instance :  his  metonymies  for  Death  are  as  numer- 
ous as  Homer's.  "  The  all-hiding  earth  has  received  him."  "  Low 
now  is  Jourdan  the  Headsman's  own  head."  "  So  dies  a  gigantic 
Heathen  and  Titan ;  stumbling  blindly,  undismayed,  down  to  his 
rest.  .  .  .  His  suffering  and  his  working  are  now  ended."  "  These 
also  roll  their  fated  journey."  Danton  "passes  to  his  unknown 
home."  "Our  grim  good-night  to  thee  is  that "  (address  to  the 
German  scoundrel  upon  his  execution). 

As  with  similitudes,  so  with  choice  circumstances,  he  has  a  way 
of  repeating  them,  keeping  them  under  the  reader's  notice,  as  often 
as  he  mentions  the  subject  Thus,  in  his  pamphlet  on  "  The  Nigger 
Question,"  he  is  perpetually  renewing  the  image  of  the  "  beautiful 
blacks  sitting  up  to  their  beautiful  muzzles  in  pumpkins."  In  the 
pamphlet  on  "  The  Present  Time,"  he  repeatedly  presents  the  re- 
forming Pope  as  "  the  good  Pope  with  the  New  Testament  in  his 
hand."  In  like  manner  he  takes  hold  of  a  title  or  expression  that 
provokes  his  mirth,  and  turns  it  to  ridicule  by  frequent  repetition ; 
thus  he  talks  of  Parliament  as  the  "  Collective  wisdom." 

Figures  of  Contrast  are  not  a  marked  feature  in  his  style.  He 
has  a  sense  of  the  effect  of  explicit  contrast,  and  sometimes  em- 
ploys it  as  a  means  of  strength ;  but  his  studied  effects  are  not  in 
the  direction  of  sharp  antithetical  point. 

He  makes  considerable  use  of  the  telling  oratorical  contrast,  the 
juxtaposition  of  strikingly  incongruous  circumstances.  In  his  Essay 
on  Voltaire  he  contrasts  the  blazing  glory  of  Tamerlane  with  the 
humble  industry  of  Johannes  Faust,  the  inventor  of  movable  types  ; 
pointing  out  that  the  humble  man's  influence  was  in  the  end  much 
the  more  powerful  of  the  two.  So  he  contrasts  the  loud  trium- 
phant proclamation  of  the  Champs  de  Mars  Federation  with  the 
signing  of  the  Scottish  Solemn  League  and  Covenant  in  a  dingy 
close  of  the  Edinburgh  High  Street,  and  with  "  the  frugal  supper 
of  thirteen  mean-dressed  men  in  a  mean  Jewish  dwelling."  The 
'French  Revolution '  is  peculiarly  rich  in  such  contrasts.  He 
makes  a  fine  thing  of  Robespierre's  resigning  a  judgeship  in  his 
younger  days  because  he  could  not  bear  to  sentence  a  human 
creature  to  death.  The  sad  end  of  Marie  Antoinette  is  contrasted 


156  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

with  her  prosperous  days  ;  the  tragic  heroism  of  Charlotte  Corday 
is  made  more  touching  by  a  fine  description  of  her  personal  beauty. 
And  in  the  "sports  of  fickle  fortune"  with  many  of  the  leading 
revolutionists,  he  finds  the  utmost  scope  for  Rembrandt  lights  and 
shadows. 

Epigram  is  not  much  in  his  way.  He  occasionally  indulges  in 
word-play,  but  it  is  hardly  epigrammatic  ;  it  has  more  of  an  affinity 
with  punning.  His  oft-repented  derivation  of  king — "Kon-ning, 
Can-ning,  or  Man  that  is  Able " — is  a  mixture  of  philology — 
fanciful  philology — and  pun.  Some  of  his  puns  are  less  doubtful. 
Thus,  "  Certain  Heathen  Physical-Force  Ultra-Chartists,  '  Danes ' 
as  they  were  then  called,  coming  into  his  territory  with  their  '  five 
points,'  or  rather  with  their  five-and-twenty  thousand  points  and 
edges  too — of  pikes,  namely,  and  battle-axes,"  &c.  So  he  says 
that  the  Lancashire  and  Yorkshire  factories  are  a  monument  to 
Richard  Arkwright,  "a  true  pyramid  ory/awie-mountain." 

Minor  Figures  and  Figures  Proper.  Hyperhole. — Our  author's 
hyperboles  consist  partly  in  the  use  of  exaggerating  similitudes, 
partly  in  unrestrained  torrents  of  extreme  epithets.  His  exagger- 
ations as  to  the  confusion  and  dishonesty  of  these  "  latter  days," 
the  general  tumble-down  and  degradation  of  the  whole  system  of 
modern  society,  are  the  most  familiar  specimens.  "  Days  of  end- 
less calamity,  disruption,  dislocation,  confusion  worse  confounded." 
"  Bankruptcy  everywhere  ;  foul  ignominy,  and  the  abomination  of 
desolation,  in  all  high  places."  Social  affairs  in  a  state  of  the 
frightfulest  embroilment,  and  as  it  were  of  inextricable  final  bank- 
ruptcy, unutterable  \\elter  of  tumbling  ruins."  "Never  till  now, 
I  think,  did  the  sun  look  down  on  such  a  jumble  of  human  non- 
senses." He  is  conscious  of  this  hyperbolic  turn,  as,  indeed,  he 
shows  himself  conscious  of  most  of  his  peculiarities.  He  speaks  of 
Teufelsdroeckh's  having  "  unconscionable  habits  of  exaggeration 
in  speech." 

When  strong  epithets,  metaphors,  similes,  and  contrasts,  put  in 
plain  forms  of  speech,  come  short  of  the  intensity  of  his  feelings, 
he  avails  himself  to  an  unprecedented  degree  of  the  bolder  licences 
of  style.  Much  of  his  peculiar  manner  is  made  up  of  the  special 
figures  of  Interrogation,  Exclamation,  and  Apostrophe. 

Interrogation  is  ;i  large  element  in  his  mannerism.  It  is  not 
merely  an  occasional  means  of  special  emphasis ;  it  is  a  habitual 
mode  of  transition,  used  by  Carlyle  almost  universally  for  the  vivid 
introduction  of  new  agents  and  new  events.  Thus — 

"But  on  the  whole,  Paris,  we  may  see,  will  have  little  to  devise  ;  will 
only  have  to  borrow  and  apply.  And  then,  as  to  the  day,  what  day  of  all 
the  calendar  is  fit,  if  the  BustiHe  Anniversary  be  not  ? " 

After  the  Queen's  execution,  he  asks,  "  Whom  next,  O  Tiuville  ?" 


FIGURES   OF   SPEECH.  157 

In  like  manner,  recounting  some  of  the  proceedings  in  the  Par- 
liamentary war,  he  says — 

"  Basing  is  black  ashes,  then :  and  Langford  is  ours,  the  Garrison  '  to 
march  forth  to-morrow  at  twelve  of  the  clock,  l>eing  the  18th  instant.'  And 
now  the  question  is,  Shall  we  attack  Dennington  or  not  ?" 

With  these  vivid  epic  interrogations,  there  is  usually,  as  in  the 
above  examples,  a  mixture  of  something  like  the  figure  called 
Vision.  He  supposes  himself  present  at  the  deliberation  of  a 
scheme,  the  preparation  of  a  great  event,  and  suggests  ideas  as  an 
interested  spectator.  Thus,  after  representing  how  Louis  deliber- 
ated whether  he  should  try  to  conciliate  the  people,  or  canvass  for 
foreign  assistance,  he  asks — "  Nay,  are  the  two  hopes  inconsistent?" 
Again,  he  apostrophises  the  National  Assembly  expecting  a  visit 
from  the  King,  with — 

"Think  therefore,  Messieurs,  what  it  may  mean  ;  especially  how  ye  will 
get  the  Hall  decorated  a  little.  .  .  .  Some  fraction  of  velvet  carpet,  can- 
iiot  that  be  spread  in  front  of  the  chair,  where  the  Secretaries  usually  sit  ?" 

One  or  two  instances  give  but  a  faint  impression  of  what  is  so 
prominent  in  his  style. 

Exclamation  occurs  in  every  mood.  Sometimes  in  wonder  and 
elation  :  sometimes  in  derision  and  contempt ;  sometimes  in  pity, 
sometimes  in  fun,  sometimes  in  real  admiration  and  affection.  An 
example  or  two  may  be  quoted.  Thus — "  How  thou  fermentest 
and  elaboratest,  in  thy  great  fermenting-vat  and  laboratory  of  an 
Atmosphere,  of  a  World,  0  Nature  !  "  Many  such  exclamations  of 
wonder  occur  in  his  Sartor.  His  exclamations  of  derision  are  ad- 
dressed, not  to  individuals,  but  to  imaginary  personages,  as  when 
he  addresses  Dryasdust, — "Surely  at  least  you  might  have  made 
an  index  for  these  books ; "  or  to  collective  masses,  as  when  he  ex- 
claims of  duellists — "  Deuce  on  it,  the  little  spitfires  !  "  Towards 
individuals  he  seldom  if  ever  expresses  either  reverential  wonder 
on  the  one  hand,  or  contempt  on  the  other.  The  scenes  of  the 
French  Revolution  often  call  forth  exclamations  of  pity  and  horror. 
"  Miserable  De  Launay  !  "  "  Hapless  Deshuttes  and  Varigny  !  " 
— such  expressions  are  frequent.  At  times,  also,  we  come  across 
such  exclamations  as — "  Horrible,  in  lauds  that  had  known  equal 
justice !  "  As  an  instance  of  a  humorous  touch,  take  his  exclama- 
tion on  one  of  the  Kaisers — "Poor  soul,  he  had  six-and-twenty 
children  by  one  wife  ;  and  felt  that  there  was  need  of  appanages  1 " 
His  expressions  of  admiration  for  his  heroes  are  numerous.  On 
Mirabeau  he  exclaims — "  Rare  union  :  this  man  can  live  self-suffic- 
ing— yet  lives  also  in  the  lives  of  other  men ;  can  make  men  love 
him,  work  with  him  ;  a  born  king  of  men  !  "  Of  Sterling  he  eays — • 
"  A  beautiful  childlike  soul ! "  Oliver  and  Friedrich  he  frequently 
salutes  with  expressions  of  sympathising  admiration.  Sometirius. 


158  THOMAS   CAKLYLE. 

as  he  has  a  habit  of  doing  with  all  his  strong  effects — in  a  kind  of 
deprecating  way — he  puts  the  exclamations  into  the  mouths  of 
other  people — "  '  Admirable  feat  of  strategy  !  What  a  general,  this 
Prince  Carl ! '  exclaimed  mankind."  "  '  Magnanimous  ! '  exclaim 
Noailles  and  the  paralysed  French  gentleman  :  '  Most  magnanimous 
behaviour  on  his  Prussian  Majesty's  part ! '  own  they." 

Apostrophe. — The  apostrophising  habit  is  perhaps  the  greatest 
notability  of  his  mannerism.  His  make  of  mind  impels  him  to 
adopt  this  art  of  style,  apart  from  his  consciousness  of  the  power 
it  gives  him  as  a  literary  artist.  It  provides  one  outlet  among 
others  for  his  deep-seated  dramatic  tendency.  Farther,  it  suits 
his  active  turn  of  mind  and  favourite  mode  of  the  enjoyment  of 
power ;  it  gives  scope  for  his  daring  familiarity  with  personages, 
whether  for  admiration  or  for  humour,  and  meets  with  no  check 
from  any  regard  for  offended  conventionalities.  Not  so  frequently 
does  he  address  in  tones  of  pity ;  still,  in  the  moving  scenes  of  the 
French  Revolution,  and  elsewhere,  some  of  his  apostrophes  are  very 
touching. 

His  style  in  its  final  development  affords  innumerable  examples. 
The  'French  Revolution'  is  particularly  full  of  dramatic  apos- 
trophes, as  indeed  of  the  irregular  figures  generally.  The  author 
sees  everything  with  his  own  eyes,  and  addresses  the  actors  in 
warning,  exhortation,  reproof,  or  whatever  their  actions  call  for. 
Usher  Maillard  is  shown  crossing  the  Bastille  ditch  on  a  plank, 
and  warned — "  Deftly,  thou  shifty  Usher :  one  man  already  fell ; 
and  lies  smashed,  far  down  there,  against  the  masonry  ! "  When 
De  Launay  is  massacred,  the  revolutionists  are  reproved  with — 
"  Brothers,  your  wrath  is  cruel ! "  "  Up  and  be  doing  !  "  "  Cour- 
age ! "  "  Quick,  then  ! "  Such  ejaculations  are  frequent ;  to 
every  movement,  in  fact,  he  contributes  the  cries  of  an  excited 
bystander. 

As  an  example  of  his  more  declamatory  apostrophes,  take  the 
following,  which  is  indeed  an  imaginary  speech  : — 

"Away,  yon  !  begone  swiftly,  ye  regiments  of  the  line!  in  the  name  of 
God  and  of  His  poor  struggling  servants,  sore  put  to  it  to  live  in  these  Iwnl 
days,  I  mean  to  rid  myself  of  you  with  some  degree  of  brevity.  To  teed  yon 
in  palaers,  to  hire  captains,  and  schoolmasters,  and  the  choicest  spiritual 
and  material  artificers  to  expend  their  industries  on  you, — No,  by  the 
Eternal !  .  .  .  Mark  it,  my  diabolic  friends,  I  mean  to  lay  leather  on 
the  backs  of  you,"  &c. 

The  following  is  an  example  of  his  pathetic  apostrophes.  In 
the  destruction  of  the  Bastille  a  prisoner's  letter  was  discovered 
with  a  passionate  inquiry  after  his  wife,  to  which  Carlyle  re- 
plies : — 

"Poor  prisoner,  who  naniest  thyself  Quiret- Dlmery,  and  hast  no  other 
history, — she  is  dead,  that  dear  wile  of  thiue,  and  thou  art  dead  I  "Tis  fifty 


SIMPLICITY.  159 

rears  since  thy  breaking  heart  put  this  question  ;  to  be  heard  now  first,  and 
long  heard,  in  the  hearts  of  men." 

His  characteristic  manner  of  drawing  the  attention  of  the  hearer 
with  an  imperative,  is  a  mode  of  apostrophe — 

"Now,  therefore,  judge  if  our  patriot  artists  are  busy  ;  taking  deep  coun- 
sel how  to  make  the  scene  worthy  of  a  look  from  the  universe. " 

It  will  have  been  noted  that  many  of  the  above-quoted  apos- 
trophes are  of  the  nature  of  the  figure  called  Vision.  Carlyle's 
histories  are,  indeed,  prolonged  ^visions ;  throughout  he  treats  the 
past  as  present,  and  makes  us,  as  it  were,  actual  spectators  of  the 
events  related. 

His  irony  is  a  department  in  itself.  It  often  turns  up  in  such 
passing  touches  as — "Our  Nell  Gwyn  defender-of-the-faith ;" 
"  Christ's  crown  soldered  on  Charles  Stuart's ; "  "  most  Christian 
kingship,  and  most  Talleyrand  bishopship ; "  Shakspeare,  "  whom 
Sir  Thomas  Lucy,  many  thanks  to  him,  was  for  sending  to  the 
treadmill."  In  his  treatment  of  modern  society,  irony  is  often 
kept  up  through  long  passages;  thus  "The  Nigger  Question"  is 
full  of  irony.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  his  irony  can  always  be  known 
as  such.  He  has  none  of  the  De  Foe  irony  that  runs  a  danger 
of  being  mistaken  for  earnest.  The  following  is  a  short  specimen, 
on  the  New  Poor-Law,  from  '  Chartism ' : — 

"To  read  the  reports  of  the  Poor- Law  Commissioners,  if  one  had  faith 
enough,  would  be  a  pleasure  to  the  friend  of  humanity.  One  sole  recipe 
seems  to  have  been  needful  for  the  woes  of  England — 'refusal  of  outdoor 
relief. '  England  lay  in  sick  discontent,  writhing  powerless  on  its  fever-bed, 
dark,  nigh  desperate,  in  wastefulness,  want,  improvidence,  and  eating  care, 
till,  like  Hyperion  down l  the  eastern  steeps,  the  Poor- Law  Commissioners 
arose,  and  said,  Let  there  be  workhouses,  and  bread  of  affliction  and  water 
of  affliction  there !  It  was  a  simple  invention ;  as  all  truly  great  inventions 
are.  And  see,  in  any  quarter,  instantly  as  the  walls  of  the  workhouse  arise, 
misery  and  necessity  fly  away,  out  of  sight,  out  of  being,  as  is  fondly  hoped, 
dissolve  into  the*  inane  ;  industry,  frugality,  fertility,  rise  of  wages,  peace 
on  earth  and  goodwill  towards  men  do, — in  the  Poor-Law  Commissioners' 
reports, — infallibly,  rapidly  or  not  so  rapidly,  to  the  joy  of  all  parties,  super- 
vene." 

QUALITIES   OP  STYLE. 
Simplicity. 

(i.)  Our  author,  as  we  remarked  in  speaking  of  his  vocabulary, 
uses  a  fair  admixture  of  homely  words.  When  hard  to  under- 
stand, he  is  so  not  from  the  use  of  technical  and  scholastic  terms, 
but  from  the  use  of  words  of  his  own  coining.  A  reader  of  Carlvle, 
not  knowing  Latin,  has  often  to  consult  a  dictionary,  and  consults 
it  in  vain.  It  is  a  jest  about  him  that  he  aspires  to  the  honour 

1  "  Down  "  is  a  small  blunder ;  it  should  be  up. 


160  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

conferred  upon  Jean  Paul  Richter,  of  having  a  dictionary  written 
for  himself. 

As  regards  his  similitudes,  we  have  already  seen  that  many  of 
them  are  homely  and  graphic,  while  the  few  stock  figures  con- 
nected with  his  fanciful  conception  of  the  universe,  the  action  of 
the  Destinies,  Eternal  Voices,  and  suchlike,  rather  perplex  than 
render  comprehension  easy.  It  should,  however,  be  noticed,  that 
to  those  once  initiated  into  the  circle  of  these  figures  they  present 
a  really  simple,  because  very  undiscriminating,  way  of  expressing 
complicated  circumstances.  "  Loyalty  to  facts "  becomes  a  very 
glib  figure  to  those  that  have  once  mastered  its  meaning. 

His  sentence-structure  is  favourable  to  simplicity,  being  free 
from  involution  and  intricacy.  The  want  of  concatenation  and 
consecutiveness  mars,  as  has  been  said,  the  intelligibility  of  his 
rhapsodical  '  Pamphlets  '  and  his  '  French  Revolution.'  These 
drawbacks  do  not  occur  so  much  in  the  FriedricL 

(2.)  His  subjects  are  far  from  abstruse,  being  narratives  and 
familiar  questions  of  practice.  The  difficulty  of  the  '  Sartor  Resar- 
tus '  is  due,  not  so  much  to  the  nature  of  the  subject,  as  to  the  in- 
tentional mystification,  and  the  substitution  of  allusions  and  figures 
for  plain  statements.  If  it  were  stript  of  its  gorgeous  imagery  and 
"  boiled  down,"  the  residuum  would  probably  be  more  intelligible 
than  interesting. 

(3.)  Occasionally,  for  the  sake  of  effects  of  comprehensive 
strength,  he  uses  abstract  expressions ;  but  his  diction  is  upon  the 
whole  concrete  to  a  degree  rarely  found  among  writers  of  prose. 
Even  when  he  uses  abstractions,  he  violates  grammar  (p.  149)  to 
give  them  plurals,  and  thereby  treat  them  as  class  names ;  he  vivi- 
fies some  of  them  further  (p.  154)  by  treating  them  as  personalities. 
His  love  of  the  concrete  often  appears  in  his  repeating  a  number  of 
suggestive  particulars  or  circumstances  instead  of  one  general  desig- 
nation. Tims,  in  his  '  Chartism,'  when  discussing  the  discontent  of 
the  working  classes,  he  refers  to  it  again  and  again  by  mentioning 
significant  symptoms — "  Glasgow  Thuggery,  Chartist  torch-meet- 
ings, Birmingham  riots,  Swing  conflagrations ; "  or  again,  "  Chart- 
ism with  its  pikes,  Swing  with  his  tinder-box."  When  he  has  to 
state  his  conviction  that  much  misery  is  caused  by  poor  Irish  labour- 
ers finding  no  work  in  Ireland,  and  coming  to  England  in  search  of 
it,  he  does  so  in  very  picturesque  terms : — 

"  But  the  thing  we  had  to  state  here  was  our  inference  from  that  mourn- 
ful fact  of  the  third  Sanspotatoe,  coupled  with  this  other  well-known  fact, 
that  the  Irish  speak  a  partially  intelligible  dialect  of  English,  and  their  fare 
across  hy  steam  is  font-pence  sterling  !  Crowds  of  miserable  Irish  darken  all 
our  towns.  The  wild  Milesian  features,  looking  false  ingenuity,  restlessness, 
unreason,  misery,  ami  mockery,  salute  you  on  all  highways  and  byways. 
The  English  coachman,  as  he  whirls  past,  lashes  the  Milesian  with  his  whip, 
curses  him  with  his  tongue  :  the  Milesian  is  holding  out  ais  hat  to  beg." 


CLEARNESS.  1C1 

When  he  desires  a  more  comprehensive  effect,  he  personifies  this 
influx  of  Irish  destitution  under  the  name  of  the  Irish  giant  Despair, 
and  thus  describes  him  : — 

"I  notice  him  in  Piccadilly,  blue-visaged,  thatched  in  rags,  a  blue 
child  on  each  arm  ;  hunger-driven,  wide-mouthed,  seeking  whom  he  may 
devour." 

With  regard  to  this  picturesque  statement,  the  remark  may  be 
made  that,  while  each  particular  is  immediately  and  easily  under- 
stood, it  may  be  doubted  whether  the  meaning  that  the  writer  pro- 
fessedly wishes  to  convey  is  so  easily  apprehended  as  it  would  be 
in  the  driest  general  statement.  Upon  the  whole,  this  excess  of 
concreteness  is  perhaps  not  in  favour  of  our  understanding  the  gen- 
eral drift,  but  the  reverse.  Most  readers  complain  that  Carlyle  is 
bewildering  in  his  prophetical  utterances.  The  excess  of  figures 
and  the  absence  of  plain  generalities  is  perhaps  partly  the  cause. 
Let  any  reader  of  ordinary  analytic  power  try,  after  reading  '  Chart- 
ism,' to  recall  the  train  of  argument,  and  he  will  find  his  confused 
recollection  of  individually  vivid  figures  rather  against  than  in 
favour  of  the  effort 

Clearness. 

Perspicuity. — In  his  expressly  didactic  or  prophetic  works,  he 
shows,  as  we  have  seen,  little  concern  to  impart  his  views  without 
confusion.  Nor  are  his  essays  so  perspicuous  as  the  essays  of 
Macaulay.  The  History  of  Friedrich  is,  however  (see  p.  120),  a 
clearer  narrative  than  the  '  History  of  England;'  it  lifts  us  more 
above  the  confusion  of  details  by  means  of  comprehensive  sum- 
maries and  divisions  with  descriptive  titles,  and  it  brings  leading 
events  into  stronger  relief  by  assigning  to  subordinate  events  a 
subordinate  place  in  the  narrative. 

Precision. — He  is  not  an  exact  writer.  Hating  close  analysis, 
his  aim  always  is  to  give  the  broad  general  features  rather  than  the 
minute  details.  He  has  little  of  the  hair-splitting,  dividing  and 
distinguishing  mania  of  De  Quincey ;  no  desire  to  sift  his  opinions 
on  a  topic,  and  say  distinctly  what  they  are  and  what  they  are  not 
Some  idea  of  the  difference  between  them  in  this  respect  is  obtained 
by  comparing  Carlyle's  various  lucubrations  on  Jean  Paul  Kichter 
with  De  Quincey 's  article  on  the  same  subject.  But  we  see  the 
utter  antagonism  of  manner  as  regards  precision  at  its  height  when 
we  reflect  how  De  Quincey  would  have  treated  such  a  subject  as 
the  discontent  of  the  working  classes.  If  Carlyle  had  been  at  pains 
to  reduce  his  political  views  to  distinct  heads  as  De  Quincey  would 
have  done,  one  would  have  been  better  able  to  judge  of  their  uni- 
versally alleged  poverty. 


162  THOMAS   CABLYLE. 


Strength. 

We  liave  already  touched  on  a  good  many  of  the  peculiarities  of 
Carlyle's  singular  force  of  style.  The  language  that  Sterling  calls 
"positively  barbarous" — the  rugged  derivatives  and  quaint  sole- 
cisms— is  very  stimulating  when  it  is  intelligible.  Among  his 
figures  of  speech  we  meet  with  many  elements  of  strength — power- 
ful and  original  similitudes,  bold  metaphors,  vivid  handling  of 
abstractions,  choice  of  telling  circumstances,  sensational  contrasts, 
habitual  exaggeration  of  language,  and  daring  liberties  with  ordi- 
nary forms  of  speech.  Here  we  have  for  the  production  of  telling 
literary  effects  a  catalogue  of  instrumentalities  that  will  hardly  be 
paralleled  from  any  writer  after  Shakspeare.  And  this  is  not  all. 
The  comprehensive  summaries,  already  mentioned  as  his  principal 
instruments  of  perspicuity,  embracing  as  they  do  a  great  range  of 
particulars,  more  than  any  other  of  his  arts,  lift  up  and  dilate  the 
mind  with  a  feeling  of  extended  power. 

The  crowning  feat  of  strength  is  the  combination  of  circum- 
stances in  effective  groups — the  imagination  of  impressive  situa- 
tions. Carlyle's  power  in  this  respect  is  nearly,  if  not  quite,  equal 
to  Shakspeare' s — equal,  that  is,  in  degree,  though  not  perhaps  in 
kind.  It  was  first  revealed  in  his  '  Sartor  Resartus ' ;  and  none  of 
bis  later  works  surpass  this  first  great  production  in  the  imagina- 
tion of  rugged  grandeur.  Take,  for  example,  his  picture  of  "  Teu- 
felsdroeckh  at  the  North  Pole  "  : — 

"  More  legitimate  and  decisively  authentic  is  Teufelsdroeckh's  appearance 
and  emergence  (we  know  not  well  whence)  in  the  solitude  of  the  North  Cape, 
on  that  June  Midnight.  He  has  a  '  light-blue  Spanish  cloak '  hanging 
round  him,  as  his  '  most  commodious,  principal,  indeed  sole  upper-gar- 
ment ; '  and  stands  there  on  the  World-promontory,  looking  over  the  infinite 
Urine,  like  a  little  blue  Belfry  (as  we  figure),  now  motionless  indeed,  yet 
ready,  if  stirred,  to  ring  quaintest  changes. 

"'Silence  as  of  death,'  writes  he;  'for  Midnight,  even  in  the  Arctic 
latitudes,  has  its  character  :  nothing  but  the  granite  cliffs  ruddy-tinged,  the 
peaceable  gurgle  of  that  slow-heaving  Polar  Ocean,  over  which  in  the  utmost 
North  the  great  Sun  hangs  low  and  lazy,  as  if  he  too  were  slumbering.  Yet 
is  his  cloud-couch  wrought  of  crimson  and  cloth-of-gold  ;  yet  does  his  light 
stream  over  the  mirror  of  waters,  like  a  tremulous  fire-pillar,  shooting  down- 
wards to  the  abyss,  and  hide  itself  under  my  feet.  In  such  moments,  Soli- 
tude also  is  invaluable  ;  for  who  would  speak,  or  be  looked  on,  when  be- 
hiii't  him  lies  all  Europe  and  Africa,  fast  asleep,  except  the  watchmen  ;  and 
before  him  the  silent  Immensity,  and  Palace  of  the  Eternal,  whereof  our 
Sun  is  but  a  porch- lamp  f ' " 

Another  fair  specimen  of  bis  combining  power  is  seen  in  Teu- 
felsdroeckh's "own  ideas  with  respect  to  duels."  This  also  shows 
a  spice  of  cynicism : — 

"Few  things,  in  this  so  surprising  world,  strike  me  with  more  surpiise. 


STRENGTH.  1C3 

Two  little  visual  Spectra  of  men,  hovering  with  insecure  cohesion  in  tlie 
midst  of  the  UNFATHOMATCLK,  and  to  dissolve  therein,  at  any  rate,  very 
soon, — make  pause  at  the  distance  of  twelve  pnres  asunder;  whirl  round; 
and,  simultaneously  by  the  cunningest  mechanism,  explode  one  another  into 
Dissolution;  and  off-hand  become  Air.  and  N  on -extant!  Deuce  on  it 
(verdammt),  the  little  spitfires  ! — Nay,  I  think  with  old  Hugo  von  Trim- 
berg  :  '  God  must  needs  laugh  outright,  could  such  a  thing  be,  to  see  His 
wondrous  Manikins  here  below  1 ' " 

In  one  of  his  later  Miscellanies,  iv.  315,  there  is  a  "Fragment 
on  Duelling"  (of  date  1850),  where  the  actual  fights  are  described 
with  startling  spirit,  and  the  surroundings  drawn  with  almost  in- 
comparable power.  This  also  is  a  good  specimen  of  his  style. 

Let  us  take  a  brief  glance  at  the  principal  themes  or  occasions 
that  excite  his  powers  of  gorgeous  expression,  (i.)  He  puts  forth 
all  his  powers  to  extol  his  favourite  recipes  for  clearing  the  world 
of  confusion.  One  or  two  fragments  of  such  eloquence  have  been 
already  given.  Above  all,  he  is  ever  on  the  watch  for  an  oppor- 
tunity of  enforcing  his  gospel  of  Work,  the  panacea  which  alone 
brings  order  out  of  confusion,  cosmos  out  of  chaos.  Such  passages 
as  the  following  may  be  described  as  "  bracing."  The  general 
effect  of  such  a  gospel  is  to  exalt  the  sense  of  active  vigour,  to 
disturb,  if  not  dispel,  the  indolent  mood  compatible  with  adoring 
reverence  or  tender  sentiment : — 

"Any  law,  however  well  meant  as  a  law,  which  has  become  a  bounty  on 
tinthrift,  idleness,  bastardy,  and  beer-drinking,  must  l>e  put  an  end  to.  In 
all  ways  it  needs,  especially  in  these  times,  to  be  proclaimed  aloud  that  for 
the  idle  man  there  is  no  place  in  this  England  of  ours.  He  that  will  not 
work,  and  save  according  to  his  means,  let  him  go  elsewhither  ;  let  him 
know  that  for  him  the  Law  has  made  no  soft  provision,  but  a  hard  and 
stern  one ;  that,  by  the  Law  of  Nature,  which  the  law  of  England  would 
vainly  contend  against  in  the  long-run,  he  is  doomed  either  to  quit  these 
habits,  or  miserably  be  extruded  from  this  earth,  which  is  made  on  principles 
different  from  these.  ...  A  day  is  ever  struggling  forward,  a  day  will 
arrive  in  some  approximate  degree,  when  he  who  has  no  work  to  do,  by 
whatever  name  he  may  be  named,  will  not  find  it  good  to  show  himself  in 
our  quarter  of  the  solar  system. " 

His  eulogy  of  the  heroes,  the  men  that  he  pronounces  to  have 
done  genuine  work  in  the  world,  has  the  same  bracing  tona  Pros- 
trate adoration,  as  we  have  seen,  does  not  suit  his  temperament ; 
he  "  fraternises "  with  the  heroes,  holds  up  them  and  their  works 
as  patterns  to  all  men  of  the  heroic  mould.  True,  he  commands 
the  multitude  to  worship,  and  declaims  against  them  if  they  refuse; 
but  he  is  rarely  found  in  the  adoring  attitude  himself. 

(2.)  Perhaps  his  richest  vein  is  his  unmeasured  invective  against 
everything  that  defeats  the  hero's  efforts  to  redress  the  universal 
confusion,  and  his  overcharged  pictures  of  that  confusion.  He  does 


164  THOMAS   CAULYLE. 

not  assail  individuals  for  single  acts — that  would  have  a  narrow 
and  rancorous  effect.  When  an  offender  crosses  his  path,  he 
denounces  him  not  personally,  but  as  one  of  "the  Devil's  Regi- 
ment," as  adding  his  little  contribution  to  the  "  bellowing  chaos," 
"  the  wide  weltering  confusion."  Most  of  his  stormy  warfare  of 
wor.ls  is  directed  against  the  evils  of  this  life  gathered  up  under 
Abstractions  familiar  to  the  most  incidental  reader  of  his  books — 
Shams,  Unveracities,  Speciosities,  Phantasms,  and  suchlike.  We 
must  be  content  for  examples  with  fragments  already  quoted. 
(See  pp.  142,  154). 

(3.)  He  describes  with  surpassing  power  the  grand  operations  of 
Nature  in  her  terrible  aspects.  He  is  not  insensible  to  beneficent 
grandeurs,  but  his  temperament  inclines  him  more  to  the  gloomy 
side — to  the  "  tropical  tornado  "  more  than  to  the  "  rainbow  and 
orient  colours."  At  times  he  represents  that  a  God,  an  Order,  a 
Justice,  presides  over  the  "  wild  incoherent  waste  ";  that  to  a  man 
understanding  the  Sphinx  riddle  (another  variety  for  the  "  eternal 
regulations  of  the  Universe"),  Nature  is  "of  womanly  celestial 
loveliness  and  tenderness;"  that  "Nature,  Universe,  Destiny, 
Existence,  however  we  name  this  grand  unnameable  fact  in  the 
midst  of  which  we  live  and  struggle,  is  as  a  heavenly  bride  and  con- 
quest to  the  wise  and  brave."  But  on  this  aspect  of  Nature  he 
dwells  less  than  on  the  opposite.  More  often  "  the  wild  Universe 
storms  in  on  Man  infinite,  vague-menacing."  It  is  on  this  aspect 
of  the  Universe  that  he  has  accumulated  his  "  Titanic  "  grandeurs 
of  expression. 

As  an  example  of  his  luxurious  revelling  in  "  sulphur,  smoke,  and 
flame,"  may  be  quoted  the  following  from  his  '  Chartism ' : — 

"  It  is  in  Glasgow  among  that  class  of  operatives  that  '  Number  60,'  in 
his  dark  room,  pays  down  the  price  of  blood.  Be  it  with  reason  or  with  un- 
reason, too  surely  they  do  in  verity  find  the  time  all  out  of  joint ;  this 
world  for  them  no  home,  but  a  dingy  prison-house,  of  reckless  unthrift, 
rebellion,  rancour,  indignation  against  themselves  and  against  all  men.  Is 
it  a  green  flowery  world,  with  azure  everlasting  sky  stretched  over  it,  the 
work  and  government  of  a  God  ;  or  a  murky,  simmering  Tophet,  of  cop- 
peras-fumes, cotton-fuz,  gin-riot,  wrath  and  toil,  created  by  a  Demon, 
governed  by  a,  Demon  ?  The  sum  of  their  wretchedness,  merited  and  un- 
merited, welters,  huge,  dark,  and  baleful,  like  a  Dantean  Hell,  visible  there 
in  the  statistics  of  Gin  ;  Gin,  justly  named  the  most  authentic  incarnation 
of  the  Infernal  Principle  in  our  times,  too  indisputably  an  incarnation  ; 
Gin,  the  black  throat  into  which  wretchedness  of  every  sort,  consummating 
itself  by  calling  on  Delirium  to  help  it,  whirls  down  ;  abdication  of  the 
power  to  think  or  resolve,  as  too  painful  now,  on  the  part  of  men  whose  lot 
of  all  others  would  require  thought  and  resolution  :  liquid  Madness  sold  at 
tenpence  the  quartern,  all  the  products  of  which  are  and  must  be,  like  its 
origin,  mad,  miserable,  ruinous,  and  that  only !  If  from  this  black,  un- 
luminous,  unheeded  inferno,  and  prison-house  of  souls  in  pain,  there  do 
flaxh  up  from  time  to  time  some  dismal  widespread  glare  of  Chartism  or  tha 
like,  uotuble  to  all,  claiming  remedy  from  all,"  &c. 


PATHOS — THE   LUDICROUS.  165 

Pathos. 

Carlyle's  writings  are  not  without  gleams  of  pathos,  all  the  more 
touching  from  the  surrounding  ruggedness.  A  man  of  strong 
special  affections,  he  dwells  with  most  moving  tenderness  on  the 
life  and  character  of  his  friends  Edward  Irving  and  John  Sterling. 
To  his  heroes — Mirabeau,  Cromwell,  Friedrich,  Burns — he  seems 
to  have  been  bound  by  something  of  the  same  personal  attach- 
ment ;  and  he  records  their  death  as  with  the  deep  sorrow  of  a 
surviving  friend. 

He  often  waxes  wroth  with  "puking  and  sprawling  Senti- 
mentalism ; "  and  the  thought  of  human  misery  seems  usually  to 
rouse  his  indignation  against  idleness  as  the  cause  of  misery,  and 
to  excite  him  to  a  more  vehement  enforcement  of  his  panacea,  the 
gospel  of  Work.  Yet  sometimes  the  thought  of  human  misery 
does  unnerve  him,  and  throw  him  into  the  melting  mood.  Thus, 
when  he  stands  with  Teufelsdroeckh  in  the  porch  of  the  "  Sanc- 
tuary of  Sorrow,"  he  cries : — 

"  Poor,  wandering,  wayward  man  !  Art  thou  not  tried,  and  beaten  with 
stripes,  even  as  I  am  ?  Ever,  whether  thou  bear  the  royal  mantle  or  the 
beggar's  gabardine,  art  thou  not  so  weary,  so  heavy-laden  ?  and  thy  Bed 
of  Rest  is  but  a  Grave.  0  my  Brother,  my  Brother  1  why  cannot  I  shelter 
thee  in  my  bosom,  and  wipe  away  all  tears  from  thy  eyes  ? " 

His  most  characteristic  pathos  is  his  subdued  sorrow  at  the 
irresistible  progress  of  time.  The  tired  labourer  mourns  wearily 
that  he  can  do  so  little,  that  time  is  so  short  This  weary  feeling 
often  crosses  his  page.  "  Agamemnon,  the  many  Againenmons, 
Pericleses,  and  their  Greece ;  all  is  gone  now  to  some  ruined 
fragments  —  dumb,  mournful  wrecks  and  blocks."  Jocelin  of 
Brakelond  is  "  one  other  of  those  vanished  existences  whose 
work  is  not  yet  vanished;  almost  a  pathetic  phenomenon,  were 
not  the  whole  world  full  of  such ! "  So  (to  give  one  more 
example)  he  moralises  as  follows  on  the  glimpse  of  Cromwell's 
cousin  in  one  of  the  Letters: — 

"Mrs  St  John  came  down  to  breakfast  every  morning  in  that  summer 
visit  of  the  year  1638,  and  Sir  William  said  grave  grace,  and  they  spake 
polite  devout  things  to  one  another ;  and  they  are  vanished,  they  and 
their  things  and  speeches, — all  silent,  like  the  echoes  of  the  old  nightin- 
gales that  sang  that  season,  like  the  blossoms  of  the  old  roses.  0  Death  ! 
O  Time  I " 

The  Ludicrous. 

His  sense  of  the  ludicrous  runs  riot;  it  may  be  said  to  be 
present  everywhere  in  his  writings.  When  not  absolutely  pre- 
dominant, it  makes  itself  felt  as  a  condiment,  adding  a  grotesque 
flavour  even  to  his  serious  declamations.  A  few  modes  of  the 
quality  may  be  specified : — 


166  THOMAS  CAELYLE. 

(i.)  His  cynicism. — While  he  often  dilates  on  the  grandeurs  of 
human  destiny,  he  not  unfrequently  sneers  at  mankind  with  dry 
contempt.  It  is  not  the  fierce  cynicism  of  Timon ;  he  is  too 
magnanimous  for  that.  He  surveys  mankind  from  an  Olympian 
height,  and  is  tickled  by  their  doings.  See  the  "  little  spitfires  " 
and  "manikins"  in  the  passage  on  duels,  p.  163.  Compare  also 
this  godlike  cynicism  with  the  despondency  of  Hamlet  To  Ham- 
let the  world  is  "a  sterile  promontory,"  "a  pestilent  congregation 
of  vapours "  ;  to  Teufelsdroeckh  in  certain  moments  the  world 
seems  "  a  paltry  dog's  cage." 

(2.)  His  derision  is,  however,  usually  more  boisterous,  less 
notably  dry.  He  is  not  personal  and  rancorous ;  he  does  not  rail 
against  individuals.  His  favourite  butts  are  certain  abstractions, 
institutions,  and  opinions ;  a  whole  pandemonium  of  Shams, — 
sham  Authorities,  sham  secretaries  of  the  Pedant  species,  <fec. — 
"vile  age  of  Pinchbeck,"  "wild  Anarchy  and  Phallus- Worship ;" 
the  Church,  Parliament,  Downing  Street,  galvanised  Catholicism, 
Kings,  Aristocracy;  Reform  movements,  Exeter  Hall  Philan- 
thropic movements,  Puseyism,  Logic,  Political  Economy,  Benth- 
amee  Radicalism,  Leading  Articles.  In  truth,  he  seems  to  dislike 
all  existing  institutions  and  all  existing  opinions,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  one  set.  He  has  thus  absolutely  unlimited  scope  for  his 
riotous  derisive  humour ;  his  field  is  the  world.  And  it  cannot 
be  denied  that  he  turns  his  position  to  the  best  account 

One  of  his  most  characteristic  proceedings  is  to  heap  contemp- 
tuous nicknames  upon  the  object  of  his  dislike.  His  command 
of  language  here  stands  him  in  good  stead.  See  his  "  Nigger 
Question,"  "The  Dismal  Science,"  "Pig-Philosophy,"  "Horse- 
hair and  Bombazeen  Procedure."  Any  page  of  his  declamations 
on  modern  society  will  give  abundance  of  examples.  Another 
favourite  device  is  to  set  up  representative  men  with  ridiculous 
names,  as  M'Croudy,  the  Right  Honourable  Zero,  the  Hon. 
Hickory  Buckskin,  the  Duke  of  Trumps,  and  many  others,  not 
to  mention  the  unquenchable  Dryasdust. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  whether  his  ridicule  be  qniet  or 
boisterous,  the  absence  of  personal  spleen  makes  it  essentially 
humorous,  not  vindictive,  bitter,  rancorous.  The  man  places 
himself  at  such  a  height  above  other  mortals,  and  is  so  sublimely 
confident  in  his  views,  that  difference  of  opinion  rather  amuses 
than  provokes  him,  and  leaves  him  free  to  turn  his  opponent  into 
ridicule  "  without  any  ill  feeling." 

(3.)  In  his  apostrophes  we  have  seen  what  humorous  liberties 
he  takes  with  individuals.  In  all  these  ludicrous  degradations 
there  is  a  redeeming  touch  of  kindness.  The  kindness  is  always 
there,  whatever  be  the  form  of  it — whether  grim,  grotesque, 
whimsical,  or  playfully  affectionate.  Even  towards  scoundrels 


MELODY — HAEMONY — TASTE.  167 

of  easy  morality,  like  WUhelmus  Sacrista  in  '  Past  and  Present,' 
he  shows  some  relenting  when  they  come  before  him  in  their 
personality  as  individuals.  Poor  William,  given  to  "libations 
and  tacenda,"  is  deposed  by  Abbot  Sauison,  and,  in  spite  of  all 
his  idleness,  gets  from  our  author  the  following  kindly  parting : — 

"  Whether  the  poor  Wilhelmus  did  not  still,  by  secret  channels,  occa- 
sionally get  some  slight  wetting  of  vinous  or  alcoholic  liquor, — now  grown, 
in  a  manner,  indispensable  to  the  poor  man  ? — Jocelin  hints  not ;  one 
knows  not  how  to  hope,  what  to  hope  !  But  if  he  did,  it  was  in  silence 
and  darkness  ;  with  an  ever-present  feeling  that  teetotalism  was  his  only 
true  course." 

His  nicknames  for  individuals  are  moderated  to  the  same  kindly 
tone  of  humour.  Karl  August  is  very  objectionable  in  the  ab- 
stract ;  yet  Carlyle  gives  him  no  harder  nickname  than  "  August 
the  Physically  Strong " ;  and  in  his  older  days,  "  August  the 
Dilapidated-Strong." 

(4.)  In  his  '  Sartor  Resartus,'  and  elsewhere,  he  shows  himself 
capable  of  the  humour  of  driving  fun  at  himself.  The  chapter 
on  Editorial  Difficulties  is  a  sample.  The  humour  is  much  more 
self-asserting  than  De  Quincey's ;  it  amounts  in  substance  to  this, 
that  he  fathers  his  most  extravagant  eccentricities  upon  a  feigned 
name,  and  criticises  them  from  an  ordinary  point  of  view  —  a 
device  for  stating,  without  the  appearance  of  extravagance,  opin- 
ions that  the  general  public  might  think  bombastic  were  they 
delivered  in  the  author's  own  person. 

(5.)  In  a  writer  of  such  brilliant  execution  as  Carlyle,  the 
quality  of  the  humour  is  much  enhanced  by  the  pleasure  arising 
from  the  freshness  of  the  language.  When  the  ludicrous  over- 
throw of  dignitaries  would  otherwise  be  apt  to  raise  serious  feel- 
ings, the  enjoyment  of  the  language  is  conciliating,  and  disposes 
the  reader  to  laugh  rather  than  be  angry.  % 

Melody — Harmony — Taste. 

As  respects  the  melodious  combination  of  words,  Carlyle,  though 
not  below  average,  is  by  no  means  a  model.  He  despises  all  study 
to  avoid  harsh  successions;  he  considers  such  art  to  be  mere 
trifling  in  the  present  age.  In  his  own  attempts  to  "  sing  " — 
that  is,  to  write  verses  before  he  fully  discovered  that  his  strength 
lay  in  prose — the  rhythm  is  conspicuously  bad. 

Still  his  prose  has  a  peculiar  strain — a  characteristic  movement 
From  such  passages  as  have  been  given,  the  reader  with  an  ear  for 
cadence  will  have  no  difficulty  in  making  it  out.  It  corresponded 
to  the  emphatic  sing-song  intonation  of  his  yoice ;  a  stately  sort  of 
rhythm,  after  a  fashion  of  stateliness  that  differs  from  De  Quincey's 
in  the  rugged  unmelodious  flow,  and  the  frequent  recurrence  of 
emphasis. 


163  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

As  regards  Harmony  between  the  rhythm  and  the  sense,  with 
Carlyle,  as  with  other  impassioned  writers,  the  agreement  is  most 
perfect  when  he  is  writing  at  full  swing  in  his  favourite  mood. 

He  has  an  ostensible  and  paraded  contempt  for  the  idea  of  art, 
or  of  composition  intended  to  please.  Himself  nothing  if  not 
artistical,  he  insists  on  being  supposed  to  wear  no  garb  but  the 
mantle  of  the  prophet.  Though  thus  formally  disavowing  art,  he 
really  does,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  sacrifice  even  truth  to  be 
artisticaL  Not  to  review  him  as  an  artist,  is  to  do  him  an  injus- 
tice. As  an  artist,  he  errs  chiefly  in  carrying  his  favourite  effects 
to  excess. 

In  the  pursuit  of  strength,  he  sometimes  intrudes  expressions 
that  approach  the  confines  of  rant  Thus,  in  the  following  extract 
he  ruins  a  passage  of  real  pathos  with  one  of  his  extravagantly 
sensational  mannerisms : — 

"For  twenty  generations  here  was  the  earthly  arena  where  powerful 
living  men  worked  out  tlieir  life-wrestle, — looked  at  by  Earth,  Heaven, 
and  Hell.  Bells  tolled  to  prayers  ;  and  men,  of  many  humours,  various 
thoughts,  chanted  vesprrs,  matins  ; — and  round  the  little  islet  of  their  life 
rolled  for  ever  (as  round  our.s  still  rolls,  though  we  are  blind  and  deaf)  the 
illimitable  Ocean,  tinting  all  things  with  its  eternal  hues  and  reflexes;  mak- 
ing strange  prophetic  music  !  How  silent  now  !  all  departed,  clean  gone. 
The  World-Dramaturgist  has  written,  Exeunt.  The  devouring  Time-Demons 
have  mad«  away  with  it  all  :  and  in  its  stead,  there  is  either  nothing ;  or 
what  is  worse,  ollVnsive  universal  dust-clouds,  and  grey  eclipse  of  Earth  ani 
Heaven,  from  'dry  rubbish  shot  here.'" 

From  this  passage,  which  opens  with  such  beauty,  common  taste 
would  probably  banish  the  World -Dramaturgist  and  the  Time- 
Demons  ;  and  the  concluding  expression  would  generally  be  re- 
garded as  unseasonable  buffoonery.  One  class  of  his  offences, 
then,  may  be  set  down  to  the  temporary  dulling  of  the  artistic 
sensej  by  over-excitement 

Farther,  his  humour  betrays  him  into  violations  of  taste.  This 
is  done  deliberately,  in  cold  blood,  not  from  over-excitement.  A 
humorous  turn  is  given  to  a  declamation  on  a  grave  subject — 
such  a  subject  as  overwhelms  the  ordinary  mind  with  seriousness. 
The  conclusion  of  the  passage  on  duelling  is  an  example.  If  an 
explanation  of  this  is  sought,  probably  none  will  be  found  except 
the  pleasure,  natural  to  strong  nerves,  of  treating  with  levity  whafc 
weaker  brethren  cannot  help  treating  with  gravity.  Partly  to  the 
same  motive  may  be  referred  his  humorous  treatment  of  the  more 
serious  outbreaks  of  the  elder  Friedrich.  On  this  have  been  passed 
some  of  the  severest  comments  that  our  author  has  received  in  the 
course  of  his  career  as  a  writer.  His  humour  causes  him  to  offend 
on  another  side.  Some  of  his  fun  is  quite  as  broad  as  the  taste 
of  the  period  will  allow.  In  such  figures  as  "owl-droppings,"  and 
"the  ostrich  turning  its  broad  end  to  heaven,"  he  goes  beyond  the 


DESCRIPTION.  1G9 

standing  limits  of  this  century.  In  'Sartor  Resartus,'  the  name 
"  Teufelsdroeckh  "  and  the  "  Nobleman's  Epitaph  "  would  hardly 
be  tolerated  if  rendered  in  the  vernacular. 

Under  errors  in  Taste  might  also  be  reckoned  his  barbarisms 
and  solecisms  of  language.  Farther,  almost  universally  he  is 
charged  with  abusing  his  vast  figurative  resources,  with  carrying 
his  figurative  manner  to  excess.  He  would  seem  to  have  bi-cn 
conscious  of  his  liability  to  this  charge  before  it  was  made :  in  a 
passage  already  quoted  from  the  Sartor,  he  speaks  of  labouring 
under  figurative  plethora.  At  the  same  time,  it  is  undoubtedly  to 
the  freshness  and  opulence  of  his  imagery  that  he  owes  a  great 
part  of  bis  reputation. 

KINDS    OP    COMPOSITION. 

Description. 

In  Carlyle's  powers  of  description  lies  one  of  his  most  indisput- 
able claims  to  high  literary  rank.  He  seems  to  have  studied  the 
art  most  elaborately.  We  can  gather  from  his  various  books  that 
all  his  life  long  he  had  watched  human  beings  and  natural  scenery 
with  an  eye  to  the  rendering  of  their  peculiarities  into  language. 
Especially  in  his  later  writings  he  describes  with  incomparable 
felicity. 

In  the  delineation  of  external  nature,  "  his  peculiarities  are  to 
bring  forward  in  strong  relief  the  comprehensive  aspects,  to  im- 
press these  by  iteration  and  by  picturesque  comparisons,  to  use 
the  language  of  the  associated  feelings,  and  in  the  shape  of  har- 
monious groupings  to  introduce  some  of  the  elements  of  poetry." 
The  following,  from  the  last  volume  of  '  Friedrich,'  exemplifies 
his  statement,  repetition,  and  illustration  of  the  general  features 
of  a  scene : —  » 

"Torgan  itself  stands  near  Elbe;  on  the  shoulder,  eastern  or  Elbeward 
shoulder,  of  a  big  mass  of  Knoll,  or  broad  Height,  called  of  Siptitz,  the  main 
eminence  of  tbe  Gau.  Shoulder,  I  called  it,1  of  this  Height,  of  Siptitz ;  hut 
more  properly  it 1  is  on  a  continuation,  or  lower  ulterior  height  dipping 
into  Elbe  itself,  that  Torgau  stands.  Siptitz  Height,  nearly  a  mile  from 
Elbe,  dips  down  into  a  straggle  of  ponds  ;  after  which,  on  a  second  or  final 
rise,  comes  Torgau  dipping  into  Elbe.  Not  a  shoulder  strict!}7,  but  rather 
a  cheek,  with  neck  intervening ; — neck  goitry  for  that  matter,  or  quaggy  with 
ponds  !  The  old  Town  stands  high  enough,  but  is  enlaced  on  the  western 
and  southern  side  by  a  set  of  lakes  and  quagmires,  some  of  which  are  still 
extensive  and  undrained.  The  course  of  the  waters  hereabouts,  and  of  Elbe 
itself,  has  had  its  intricacies  ;  close  to  north-west,  Torgau  is  bordered,  in  a 
straggling  way,  by  what  they  call  Old  Elbe  ;  which  is  not  now  a  fluent  entity, 
but  a  stagnant  congeries  of  dirty  waters  and  morasses.  The  Hill  of  Siptits 


1  The  two  its  with  different  references  are  awkward.    In  place  of  "  I  called  it,* 
he  should  have  used  some  such  expression  as  "  I  said,"  without  the  it. 


170  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

abuts  in  that  aqueous  or  quaggy  manner ;  its  fore-feet  being,  as  it  were,  at 
or  in  Elbe  River,  and  its  sides,  to  the  south  and  to  the  north  for  some  dis- 
tance each  way,  considerably  enveloped  in  ponds  and  boggy  difficulties." 

The  following,  from  his  article  on  Dr  Francia,  illustrates  his 
dexterity  in  making  a  description  vivid  by  imagining  the  feelings 
of  a  spectator : — 

"Few  things  in  late  war,  according  to  General  Miller,  have  been  more 
noteworthy  than  this  march.  The  long  straggling  line  of  soldiers,  six 
thousand  and  odd,  with  their  quadrupeds  and  baggage,  winding  through 
the  heart  of  the  Andes,  breaking  for  a  brief  moment  the  old  abysmal  soli- 
tudes !  For  you  fare  along,  on  some  narrow  roadway,  through  stony  laby- 
rinths ;  huge  rock-mountains  hanging  over  your  head  on  this  hand,  and 
under  your  feet  on  that ;  the  roar  of  mountain-cataracts,  horror  of  hottomless 
chasms  ; — the  very  winds  and  echoes  howling  on  you  in  an  almost  preter- 
natural manner.  Towering  rock-barriers  rise  sky-high  before  you,  and  behind 
you,  and  around  you  ;  intricate  the  outgate  !  The  roadway  is  narrow  ;  foot- 
ing none  of  the  best.  Sharp  turns  there  are,  where  it  will  behove  you  to 
mind  your  paces  ;  one  false  step,  and  you  will  need  no  second  ;  in  the  gloomy 
jaws  of  the  abyss  you  vanish,  and  the  spectral  winds  howl  requiem.  Some- 
what better  are  the  suspension-bridges,  made  of  bamboo  and  leather,  though 
they  swing  like  see-saws  :  men  are  stationed  with  lassos,  to  gin  you  dexter- 
ously, and  fish  you  up  from  the  torrent,  if  you  trip  there." 

This  passage  is  also  a  good  example  of  a  description  where  the 
particulars  support  each  other :  along  with  towering  rocks  and  a 
narrow  roadway  we  naturally  expect  huge  abysses  and  roaring 
waters.  The  mention  of  the  hollow  winds  shows  his  sensibility 
to  harmonious  poetical  effects. 

"A  description  is  more  easily  and  fully  realised  when  made 
individual — that  is,  presented  under  all  the  conditions  of  a  par- 
ticular moment  of  time."  Our  author  fully  understands  this :  it 
is  one  of  his  cardinal  arts.  His  works  abound  in  picturesque 
allusions  to  seasons  and  times,  to  temporary  attitudes  of  things 
and  persons.  Thus,  in  his  '  Life  of  Sterling ' : — 

"  One  day  in  the  spring  of  1836, 1  can  still  recollect,  Sterling  had  proposed 
to  me,  liy  way  of  wide  ramble,  useful  for  various  ends,  that  I  should  walk 
with  him  to  Eltharn  and  back,  to  see  this  Edgeworth,  whom  I  also  knew  a 
little.  We  went  accordingly  together ;  walking  rapidly,  as  was  Sterling's 
wont,  and,  no  doubt.,  talking  extensively.  It  probably  was  in  the  end  of 
February  ;  /  can  remember  leafless  hedges,  grey  driving  clouds,  procession  of 
boar  ding -scJiool  girls  in  some  quiet  part  of  the  route. " 

Again — 

"At  length  some  select  friends  were  occasionally  admitted  ;  signs  of  im- 
provement began  to  appear  ;  and,  in  the  brigJd  twilight,  Kensington  Gardens 
were  green,  and  sky  and  earth  were  hopeful,  as  one  went  to  make  inquiry. 
Tlie  summer  brilliancy  was  abroad  over  tlie  world  before  we  fairly  saw  Ster- 
ling again  sub  dto." 

Iii  his  account  of  Walter  Raleigh's  execution  one  sentence  is 


DESCRIPTION.  17! 

"A  cold  hoar-frosty  morning."     Such  touches  as  the  following  are 
pretty  frequent : — 

"The  Scots  delivered  their  fire  with  such  constancy  and  swiftness,  it  was 
as  if  the  whole  air  had  become  an  element  of  fire — in  the  ancient  summer 
gloaming  there." 

In  describing  the  tumults  after  the  capture  of  the  Bastile,  he  sud- 
denly breaks  in — 

"  0  evening  sun  of  July,  how,  at  this  hour,  thy  beams  fall  slant  on  renpers 
amid  peaceful  woody  fields;  on  old  women  spinning  in  cottages  ;  on  ships 
far  out  in  the  silent  main ;  on  Balls  at  the  Orangerie  of  Versailles,  where 
high-rouged  Dames  of  the  Palace  are  even  now  dancing  with  double-jacketed 
Hussar-officers, — and  also  on  this  roaring  Hell-porch  of  a  H6tel-de- Ville  !  " 

One  of  his  most  effective  groupings  is  the  bivouac  of  the  army 
that  we  have  just  seen  described  in  their  passage  over  the  Andes — 

"  What  an  entity,  one  of  those  night-leaguers  of  San  Martin  ;  all  steadily 
snoring  there  in  the  heart  of  the  Andes  under  the  eternal  stars  I  Wayworn 
sentries  with  difficulty  keep  themselves  awake ;  tired  mules  chew  barley 
rations,  or  doze  on  three  legs ;  the  feeble  watch-tire  will  hardly  kindle  a 
cigar ;  Canopus  and  the  Southern  Cross  glitter  down  ;  and  all  snore  steadily, 
begirt  by  granite  deserts,  looked  on  by  the  Constellations  in  that  manner.'1 

His  narratives  are  eminently  pictorial.  At  every  step  in  the 
succession  of  events  we  are  stopped  to  look  at  some  posture  of  the 
actors  or  their  surroundings.  This  is  one  of  the  most  striking 
features  in  the  '  French  Revolution ' ;  it  may  be  called  a  historic 
word-tapestry,  a  series  of  significant  word-pictures ;  it  rather  de- 
scribes events  in  order  than  relates  the  order  of  events.  A  short 
example  can  give  but  a  faint  idea  of  the  character  of  such  a  work ; 
the  following  specimen  is  taken  at  random.  It  describes  the  storm- 
ing of  the  palace  of  Versailles  by  a  mob : — 

"Woe  now  to  all  body-guards,  mercy  is  none  for  them  !  Miomandre  de 
Sainte-Marie  pleads  with  soft  words,  on  the  grand  staircase,  'descending 
four  steps'  to  the  roaring  tornado.  His^comrades  snatch  him  up,  by  the 
skirts  and  belts  ;  literally  from  the  jaws  of  Destruction ;  and  slam-to  their 
door.  This  also  will  stand  few  instants  ;  the  panels  shivering  in,  like  pot- 
sherds. Barricading  serves  not :  fly  fast,  ye  body-guards  !  rabid  Insurrection, 
like  the  Hellhound  Chase,  uproaring  at  your  heels  ! 

' '  The  terror-struck  body-guards  fly,  bolting  and  barricading  ;  it  follows. 
Whitherward  ?  Through  hall  on  hall :  woe,  now  !  towards  the  Queen's  suite 
of  rooms,  in  the  furthest  room  of  which  the  Queen  is  now  asleep.  Five  sen- 
tinels rush  through  that  long  suite  ;  they  are  in  the  ante-room  knocking 
loud:  'Save  the  Queen!'  Trembling  women  fall  at  their  feet  with  tears: 
are  answered :  '  Yes,  we  will  die  ;  save  ye  the  Queen  ! ' 

"  Tremble  not,  women,  but  haste:  for,  lo,  another  voice  shouts  far  through 
the  outermost  door,  '  Save  the  Queen ! '  and  the  door  is  shut.  It  is  brave 
Miomandre's  voice  that  shouts  this  second  warning'.  He  has  stormed  across 
imminent  death  to  do  it ;  fronts  imminent  death,  having  done  it.  Brave 
Tardivet  du  Repaire,  bent  on  the  same  desperate  service,  was  borne  down 
with  pikes ;  his  comrades  hardly  snatched  him  in  again  ulive.  Miomaudre 


172  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

and  Tardivet :  let  the  names  of  these  two  Body-guards,  as  the  names  of  brave 
men  should,  livp  long. 

"  Trembling  Maids  of  Honour,  one  of  whom  from  afar  caught  glimpse  of 
Miomandre,  as  well  as  heard  him,  hastily  wrap  up  the  Queen  ;  not  in  robes 
of  state.  She  flies  for  her  life,  across  the  (Eil-de-Bceuf ;  against  the  main- 
door  of  which,  too,  Insurrection  batters.  She  is  in  the  King's  apartment, 
in  the  King's  arms ;  she  clasps  her  children  amid  a  faithful  few.  The 
imperial-hearted  hursts  into  mother's  tears :  '  0  my  friends,  save  me  and  my 
children  !  0  mes  amis,  sauvez  moi  et  mesenfans  ! '  The  battering  of  Insur- 
rectionary axes  clangs  audible  across  the  CEil-de-Bceuf.  What  an  hour  !  " 

We  might  institute  a  comparison  between  Macaulay  and  Carlyle 
as  regards  the  description  of  human  beings.  Take  equal  portions 
of  their  historical  works  and  you  find  a  greater  abundance  of  con- 
crete circumstances  in  Carlyle  than  in  Macaulay.  As  a  pictorial 
artist  Carlyle  is  of  the  two  the  most  studied  and  elaborate.  Hardly 
an  individual  crosses  Carlyle's  page  that  is  not  made  to  appear  in 
some  characteristic  attitude,  or  under  some  significant  image :  a 
much  greater  proportion  of  Macaulay's  personages  are  mere  names 
and  functionaries.  But  let  us  take  any  individual  that  plays  a 
prominent  part  in  the  narrative,  and  we  shall  probably  find  that 
Macaulay,  in  his  diffuse  way,  records  the  greater  number  of  facts 
concerning  him.  We  have  seen  that  it  is  so  in  the  case  of  John- 
son (p.  1 1 8).  Macaulay's  narrative  contains  fewer  concrete  cir- 
cumstances upon  the  whole,  but  more  concerning  any  prominent 
individual. 

This  difference  between  our  two  authors  connects  itself  with  a 
deeper  difference.  Carlyle  is  more  subjective  than  Macaulay :  he 
systematically  attempts  to  picture  the  inner  man.  Partly  as  a 
consequence  of  this,  he  gives  fewer  circumstances:  the  diffuse 
Macaulay,  taking  no  trouble  to  group  circumstances  about  a  few 
leading  qualities  of  mind,  gives  freely  out  of  the  abundance  of  his 
memory ;  but  Carlyle  gives  only  circumstances  that  he  sees  to  be 
characteristic,  that  he  is  able  to  read  into  consistency  with  his 
ideas  of  the  man's  nature.  Macaulay  gives  numerous  outward 
particulars,  sayings,  and  doings  gathered  with  confident  hand  from 
all  manner  of  anecdotes  and  reminiscences,  and  leaves  readers 
very  much  to  their  own  inferences  as  to  the  thoughts  and  feelings 
that  passed  underneath  these  appearances.  He  is  pre-eminently 
objective,  and  his  record  of  circumstances  is  given  in  an  easy  ex- 
cursive way.  Carlyle,  on  the  other  hand,  laboriously  masters  the 
sharacters  of  the  leading  personages  in  the  events  that  he  relates, 
and  struggles  to  conceive  and  to  represent  how  they  felt  and  how 
they  expressed  their  feelings  in  the  various  situations  touched 
upon  in  his  narrative :  he  is  too  intensely  concentrated  upon  the 
immediately  relevant  situations  to  go  gossiping  away  into  previous 
incidents  in  the  lives  of  the  personages  concerned. 

Take  as  a  faint  illustration  one  particular  case.      Macaulay'a 


NARRATIVE.  173 

account  of  the  English  Revolution  is  much  less  pictorial  upon  the 
whole  than  Carlyle's  Trench  Revolution.'  But  Macaulay  gives 
us  a  great  many  more  particulars  concerning  the  principal  states- 
men at  the  Court  of  Charles  II.  than  Carlyle  gives  us  concerning 
the  principal  statesmen  at  the  Court  of  Louis  XV.  Carlyle  takes 
up  a  particular  moment,  the  illness  of  Louis  XV.,  and  dramatically 
represents  how  this  fact  was  regarded  by  various  personages  and 
classes  throughout  Paris  according  to  their  several  characters :  the 
abundant  pictorial  matter  is  given  chiefly  in  illustration  of  char- 
acteristic thoughts  and  feelings. 

Narrative. 

As  already  incidentally  remarked  (p.  161),  Carlyle's  narrative 
method  is  seen  to  most  advantage  in  his  '  Friedrich.'  In  the 
*  French  Revolution '  there  are  many  defects  afterwards  overcome. 
The  introduction  of  new  personages  is  there  less  carefully  attended 
to.  There  also  he  errs  greatly  iu  the  excess  of  his  moralisiugs  and 
preachings,  which  perpetually  interrupt  the  narrative. 

In  the  '  Friedrich,'  through  his  intense  desire  to  be  lucid,  to  put 
Himself  in  the  reader's  place,  and  appreciate  difficulties,  the  minor 
arts  of  narrative  are  carefully  observed.  His  ordinary  narrative 
paragraph,  although  never  absolutely  perfect,  is  seldom  perplexed 
by  the  confusion  of  the  persons  acting.  He  always  notices  the 
appearance  or  disappearance  of  important  agents,  and,  knowing 
ttie  difficulties  of  description,  does  not  unguardedly  shift  the 
scenes.  His  long  introduction  to  the  history  of  Friedrich's  reign, 
extending  through  two  volumes,  is  exemplary  in  these  respects : 
whatever  may  be  said  of  the  wild  phantasmagoric  or  pantomimic 
character  of  the  narrative,  it  certainly  has  the  merit  of  making  us 
distinctly  aware  when  new  figures  appear,  and  when  they  depart, 
and  of  not  only  bringing  but  keeping  under  our  attention  the 
place  and  the  circumstances.  He  also  understands  well  the  neces- 
sity of  supporting  the  main  story  in  its  place  of  prominence,  of 
indicating  collateral  and  dependent  events  in  their  proper  char- 
acter, and  of  making  all  his  transitions  broad  and  apparent  Hia 
imaginary  authorities,  Dryasdust  and  Sauerteig,  and  "  the  well- 
known  hand"  that  contributes  subordinate  narratives,  have  this 
to  be  said  as  a  justification  of  their  existence,  that  they  do  help  to 
keep  separate  what  the  author  considers  of  inferior  from  what  he 
considers  of  superior  importance.  Dryasdust  gives  numerous  par- 
ticulars of  small  consequence  about  the  private  life  of  the  prince, 
and  does  such  dry  business  as  "  A  peep  into  the  Nosti-Grumkow 
Correspondence  caught  up  in  St  Mary  Axe  :  "  Sauerteig  gives  wild 
views  about  the  proper  persons  to  write  history,  and  does  the  un- 
palatable work  of  defending  old  Friedrich's  character  in  the  loftiest 


174  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

Carlylian  manner  ;  the  "  well-known  hand  "  gives  us  in  small  print 
Prince  Karl's  operations  on  the  Rhine,  the  account  of  Skipper 
Jenkins,  the  life  of  Voltaire,  and  suchlike  particulars  subsidiary  to 
the  main  narrative. 

One  great  help  to  the  lucidity  of  his  narrative  is  the  titular 
summaries,  or  labels,  as  he  calls  them.  They  lighten  the  heavy 
body  of  the  narrative,  giving  the  reader  a  natural  break  or  stop, 
an  opportunity  for  looking  back  and  forward.  Every  book  has 
its  descriptive  heading — "  Double-Marriage  Project,  and  Crown 
Prince,  going  adrift  under  the  Storm-winds,  1727-1730:"  "Fear- 
fu'  Shipwreck  of  the  Double-Marriage  Project,  February — Novem- 
l'«i  1730:"  "Crown-Prince  Retrieved;  Life  at  Ciistrin,  Novem- 
ber 1730 — February  1732."  By  these  more  comprehensive  head- 
ings, we  are  enabled  to  run  over  the  general  succession  of  events 
•without  confusion.  Then,  the  books  are  subdivided  into  chapters, 
each  with  a  descriptive  "label";  and  within  the  chapters  there 
are  divisions  of  still  smaller  compass.  Thus,  the  leading  subject 
of  one  chapter  is  "Death  of  George  L:"  as  a  minor  subject  we 
have — "  His  Prussian  Majesty  falls  into  one  of  his  Hypochondria- 
cal  Fits."  The  leading  title  of  another  chapter  is  "  Visit  to 
Dresden  ;"  tlie  minor  "  labels  "  are — "  The  Physically  strong  pays 
his  Counter  Visit ;"  and — "  Of  Princess  Wilhelmina's  Four  Kings 
and  other  Ineffectual  Suitors."  With  this  care  in  dividing  and 
subdividing,  the  table  of  Contents  becomes  a  vertebrate  skeleton 
of  the  work,  instead  of  being  merely  an  analysis  without  any  dis- 
crimination of  degrees  of  importance.  * 

Upon  the  whole  it  may  safely  be  affirmed  that  by  one  means 
or  another,  ordinary  and  extraordinary,  he  makes  his  narratives 
the  most  lucid  productions  of  their  kind.  It  may  be  a  question 
whether  he  has  not  made  sacrifices  to  distinctness,  and  whether 
he  might  not  have  been  equally  lucid  without  being  offensively 
eccentric. 

In  the  Explanation  of  Events,  he  proceeds  with  his  natural  per- 
spicacity, though  he  grumbles  a  good  deal  at  being  obliged  to 
explain.  Thus,  he  enters  at  considerable  length  into  the  sources 
and  the  progress  of  the  quarrel  between  old  Friedrich  and  George 
II.,  enumerating  separately  five  causes.  His  manner  of  explana- 
tion is  thoroughly  his  own.  Dry  analysis  being  distasteful  to  him, 
he  proceeds  dramatically,  disclosing  the  moving  springs  of  events 
in  supposed  soliloquies,  and  personal  communications  oral  and 
verbal  between  the  leading  agents,  himself  being  usually  present, 
and  putting  in  his  word  after  the  fashion  of  a  Greek  chorus. 
How  different  his  manner  is  from  the  ordinary  way  of  writing  his- 
tory, need  hardly  be  pointed  out. 

Two  short  passages  from  his  account  of  the  above-mentioned 


NARRATIVE.  175 

quarrel  "between  the  Britannic  and  Prussian  Majesties"  are  all  we 
have  room  for : — 

"'My  Brother  the  ComSdiant'  (George  II.)  'quietly  put  his  Father's 
Will  iu  his  pocket,  I  have  heard  ;  and  paid  no  regard  to  it  (except  what  he 
was  compelled  to  pay,  by  Chesterfield  and  others).  Will  he  do  the  like 
with  his  poor  Mother  s  Will  ? '  Patience,  your  Majesty  :  he  is  not  a  covet- 
ous man,  but  a  self-willed  and  a  proud, — always  conscious  to  himself  that  he 
is  the  soul  of  honour,  this  poor  brother  King." 

"  Very  soon  after  George's  accession  there  began  clouds  to  rise ;  the  per- 
fectly accomplished  little  George  assuming  a  severe  and  high  air  towards  his 
rustic  Brother-in-law.  'We  cannot  stand  these  Prussian  enlistments  and 
encroachments ;  rectify  these  in  a  high  and  severe  manner  ! '  says  George  to 
his  Hanover  officials.  George  is  not  warm  on  his  throne  till  there  comes  in, 
accordingly,  from  the  Hanover  officials,  a  complaint  to  that  effect,  and  even 
a  List  of  Hanoverian  subjects,  who  are,  owing  to  various  injustices,  now 
serving  in  the  Prussian  ranks.  '  Your  Prussian  Majesty  is  requested  to  re- 
turn us  these  men  ! ' 

"  This  List  is  dated  22d  January  1728  ;  George  only  a  few  months  old  in 
his  new  authority  as  yet.  The  Prussian  Majesty  grumbles  painfully  respon- 
sive :  '  Will,  with  eagerness,  do  whatever  is  just ;  most  surely  !  But  is  his 
Britannic  Majesty  aware  ?  Hanover  officials  are  quite  misinformed  as  to  the 
circumstances  ;'  and  does  not  return  any  of  the  men.  Merely  a  pacific 
grumble,  and  nothing  done  in  regard  to  the  complaints.  Then  there  is  the 
meadow  of  Clanrei  which  we  spoke  of  :  '  That  belongs  to  Brandenburg  you 
say?  Nevertheless,  the  contiguous  parts  of  Hanover  have  rights  upon  it.' 
Some  '  eight  cartloads  of  hay,'  worth,  say,  almost  $1.  or  loZ.  sterling  :  who 
»s  to  mow  that  grass  I  wonder  ? 

"Friedrich  Wilhelm  feels  that  all  this  is  a  pettifogging,  vexatious  course 
of  procedure  ;  and  that  his  little  cousin,  the  Comodiant,  is  not  treating  him 
very  like  a  gentleman.  '  Is  he,  your  Majesty  1 '  suggests  the  Smoking  Par- 
liament." 

His  deep-seated  dramatic  tendency  leads  him  to  such  forms, 
when  he  does  condescend  to  "  motive-grinding."  Explanation  on 
the  larger  scale  he  scouts ;  he  has  no  patience  with  "  philosophi- 
cal "  histories.  He  does  not  want  to  have  great  events  traced  to 
their  chief  causes ;  he  prefers  that  they  should  remain  in  mystery. 
He  lays  his  ban  on  all  attempts  to  give  reasons  for  the  '  French 
Revolution.' 

"  To  gauge  and  measure  this  immeasurable  Thing,  and  what  is  called 
account  for  it,  and  reduce  it  to  a  dead  logic-formula,  attempt  not  !  .  .  . 
As  an  actually  existing  Son  of  Time,  look  with  unspeakable  manifold  inter- 
est, oftenest  in  silence,"  &c. 

Yet  in  the  dramatic  form,  he  does,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  give  the 
commonplace  explanation,  that  the  masses  found  the  yoke  of  their 
superiors  intolerable. 

Carlyle  has  his  doubts  about  the  propriety  of  making  History  a 
schoolmistress.  "  Before  Philosophy  can  teach  by  Experience,"  he 
says,  "  the  Philosophy  has  to  be  in  readiness,  the  Experience  must 


176  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

be  gathered  and  intelligibly  recorded."  Yet,  like  most  other  his- 
torians, he  makes  use  of  history  to  illustrate  his  peculiar  doctrines, 
ethical,  religious,  and  political  Not  that  he  is,  like  Macaulay, 
continually  building  up  arguments  in  support  of  his  views.  He 
does  not  argue,  he  declaims.  He  sets  up  certain  men,  Oliver 
Cromwell  and  the  two  Friedrichs,  as  shining  examples  of  Duty, 
Veracity,  and  Justice,  and  upon  every  colourable  opportunity  ex- 
tols them  for  their  exercise  of  these,  his  favourite  virtues.  He  ia 
drawn  to  the  Great  Rebellion,  because  it  affords  "  the  last  glimpse 
of  the  Godlike  vanishing  from  this  England ;  conviction  and  vera- 
city giving  place  to  hollow  cant  and  formulism."  He  loves  and 
praises  old  Friedrich  in  spite  of  his  ungovernable  temper,  because 
"  he  went  about  suppressing  platitudes,  ripping  off  futilities,  turn- 
ing deceptions  inside  out;"  because  "the  realm  of  Disorder,  which 
is  Unveracity,  Unreality,  what  we  call  Chaos, has  no  fiercer  enemy." 
He  writes  the  history  of  young  Friedrich,  although  "  to  the  last  a 
questionable  hero,"  because  he  was  an  able  ruler,  and  "  had  noth- 
ing whatever  of  the  Hypocrite  or  Phantasm."  In  every  case  he 
takes  for  granted  the  excellence  of  his  favourite  virtues;  more  than 
that,  he  tacitly  assumes  and  maintains  that  they  atone  for  every 
other  immorality.  His  excuses  of  old  Friedrich's  severities  on  the 
score  of  justice,  have  called  out  loud  expressions  of  indignation 
from  the  reviewers  of  his  History. 

Farther,  he  has  not  escaped  the  imputation  of  colouring  charac- 
ters and  garbling  facts  under  the  bias  of  his  narrow  standard  of 
morality.  In  the  opinion  of  a  distinguished  French  critic,  he  has 
misconceived  and  distorted  the  history  of  the  French  Revolution 
from  a  habitual  effort  to  vilify  whoever  has  a  different  theory  of 
life  from  himself. 

For  such  as  are  not  repelled  by  his  many  eccentricities  and 
arrogant  judgments,  Carlyle's  histories  possess  an  intense  charm. 
Without  recurring  to  the  elements  of  power  in  his  style,  we  here 
glance  briefly  at  his  use  of  the  opportunities  peculiar  to  narrative. 

The  interest  of  his  narrative  is  very  largely  personal.  Scenery 
and  military  movements  he  describes  with  the  most  graphic  power  ; 
but  he  is  constantly  at  the  right  hand  of  individuals  rejoicing  in 
their  strength  as  the  prime  movers  of  great  transactions.  He 
records  public  transactions,  but  he  keeps  his  heroes  in  the  fore- 
ground or  stays  with  them  in  the  background  as  the  centres  of 
power.  In  our  small  quotations  to  show  his  mode  of  explaining 
events,  this  appears  incidentally ;  but  no  illustration  could  bring 
out  fully  what  is  so  pervading  a  character  of  all  his  histories.  He 
gives  the  prominence  to  individuals  on  principle :  assigning  to 
"great  men,"  "heroes,"  a  prodigious  influence  on  the  affairs  of 
the  world,  he  carries  this  so  far  as  to  think  their  sayings  and 


EXPOSITION.  177 

doings  alone  worthy  of  permanent  record.  Tittle-tattle  about 
inferior  personages,  Acts  of  Parliament,  and  suchlike,  he  makes 
over  to  Dryasdust ;  and  certainly  his  intensely  personal  method 
has  the  advantage  in  point  of  sensational  interest  His  exaltation 
of  heroes,  if  not  the  most  accurate  way  of  representing  human 
transactions,  is  doubtless  the  most  artistic:  every  drama  requires 
a  central  figure. 

With  his  strong  sense  of  dramatic  effect  Carlyle's  plot  would  be 
almost  as  absorbing  as  a  sensational  novel,  were  we  not  generally 
aware  beforehand  from  other  sources  what  is  to  be  the  upshot. 
Judge  by  reading,  for  example,  his  account  of  the  Crown-Prince's 
attempted  flight  from  the  cruelties  of  old  Friedrich.  Note  also, 
generally,  his  art  of  introducing  a  name  with  some  such  phrase  as 
"Mark  this  man  well;  we  shall  perhaps  hear  of  him  again." 

The  interest  in  the  progress  of  mankind,  so  notable  in  Macaulay, 
is  greatly  wanting  in  Carlyle.  There  could  hardly  be  a  greater 
contrast  than  between  the  glowing  optimist  and  the  despairing 
prophet ;  between  the  hopeful  opening  of  the  '  History  of  England  ' 
and  the  doleful  opening  of  the  '  Letters  and  Speeches  of  Oliver 
CromwelL'  In  Carlyle's  histories,  the  absorbing  interest  of  suc- 
cession, of  gradual  development,  is  not  wanting ;  but  it  is  the 
interest  of  plot,  of  suspended  expectation,  not  the  cheering  inter- 
est of  increase  in  human  wellbeing.  To  the  patriotic  Prussian, 
indeed,  his  '  History  of  Friedricii  '  would  be  exhilarating,  as  show- 
ing the  gradual  advance  of  the  House  of  Brandenburg :  and  even 
the  philanthropist  might  rejoice  to  see  the  people  prospering  under 
the  rule  of  Friedrich.  But  little  encouragement  to  jubilation  of 
any  kind  is  given  by  the  sardonic  historian.  His  eye  is  rather  on 
the  Phantasms  that  remain,  than  on  the  Phantasms  that  have  been 
trodden  under  foot. 

Exposition. 

From  Carlyle  the  student  will  learn  no  delicate  arts  of  exposition. 
In  considering  the  intellectual  qualities  of  his  style,  simplicity  and 
clearness,  we  saw  what  he  does  to  make  himself  readily  and  dis- 
tinctly intelligible.  With  his  immense  command  of  words  he  is 
able  to  repeat  his  doctrines  in  great  variety  of  forms.  He  is  most 
profuse  in  similitudes.  The  two  great  drawbacks  to  his  powers  of 
exposition  are,  (i)  that  he  deliberately  prefers  imperfect  hints  and 
figurative  sayings  to  complete  and  plain  expression ;  and  (2)  that 
his  examples  are  not  typical  cases,  but  selected  for  stage  effect. 

His  character-drawing  is  one  of  his  chief  distinctions.  It  is 
elaborately  studied,  and  in  many  points  the  execution  is  admir- 
able. His  sketch  of  the  outward  man  seldom  fails  to  be  felici- 
tous; not  groping  about  confusedly  in  minor  details  of  feature  ot 

M 


178  THOMAS  CARLYLE. 

of  figure,  but  dashing  off  the  general  likeness  with  bold  compre- 
hensive strokes. — See  his  description  of  George's  two  mistresses 
(p.  153),  and  Mentzel  (p.  150).  His  description  of  Leibnitz  is 
also  good  as  regards  the  externals,  though  perhaps  it  would  bear 
filling  out  in  other  respects :  "  Sage  Leibnitz,  a  rather  weak,  but 
hugely  ingenious  old  gentleman,  with  bright  eyes  and  long  nose, 
with  vast  black  peruke  and  bandy  legs."  These  are  but  slender 
specimens  of  his  art,  probably  far  from  being  the  best  that  could 
be  produced ;  but  the  reader  will  have  no  difficulty  in  finding 
others ;  he  describes  every  person  that  crosses  his  pages. 

As  a  rule,  he  is  satisfied  with  a  few  suggestive  strokes ;  but 
occasionally  he  fills  in  the  picture.  When  he  does  so,  he  gives  the 
general  view  first,  and  then  tells  of  particular  after  particular, 
deliberately,  and  with  some  similitude  or  collateral  circumstance 
to  fix  each  particular  distinctly  in  the  mind.  His  description  of 
Friedrich  in  the  two  first  pages  of  his  history,  is  one  of  his  most 
finished  delineations. 

He  carries  the  same  art  of  clear  broad  touches  into  his  descrip- 
tion of  character.  He  is  not  perverted  by  likes  or  dislikes  from 
trying  to  give  the  broad  outlines  truly ;  as  a  rule,  he  looks  at  a 
character  only  with  the  eye  of  an  artist :  and  as  a  rule,  his  vigor- 
ous portraiture  of  the  general  temperament  is  true  to  nature.  An 
example  or  two  will  show  how  he  always  aims  at  comprehensive 
general  views.  We  take  them  at  random  : — 

"This  Jocelin,  as  we  can  discern  well,  was  an  ingenious  and  ingenuous,  a 
cheery-hearted,  innocent,  yet  withal  shrewd  noticing  quick-witted  man ;  and 
from  under  his  monk's  cowl  has  looked  out  on  that  narrow  section  of  the 
world  in  a  really  human  manner  ;  not  in  any  simial,  canine,  ovine,  or  other- 
wise inhuman  manner,"  &c. 

"  The  eupeptic,  right-thinking  nature  of  the  man  ;  his  sanguineous  temper, 
with  its  vivacity  and  sociality,  an  ever-busy  ingenuity,  rather  small  perhaps, 
but  prompt,  hopeful,  useful,  always  with  a  good  dash,  too,  of  Scotch  shrewd- 
ness, Scotch  canniness ;  and  then  a  loquacity,  free,  fervid,  yet  judicious, 
canny, — in  a  word,  natural  vehemence,  wholesomely  covered  over  and  tem- 
pered (as  Sancho  has  it)  in  'three  inches  of  old  Chris  tian/a£/' — all  these 
fitted  Baillie  to  be  a  leader  in  General  Assemblies,"  &c. 

In  these  short  dashing  portraitures,  perhaps  the  only  thing  worth 
objecting  to  is  a  certain  want  of  order.  It  is  when  we  come  to  the 
minute  detail  of  character  that  we  become  conscious  of  a  weakness 
in  the  scientific  foundations.  Carlyle's  failure  should  warn  all  of 
the  danger  of  despising  psychological  analysis,  and  at  the  same 
time  producing  an  analysis  made  out  by  common-sense  with  the 
assistance  of  capricious  fancy.  De  Quincey  had  too  clear  an  insight 
to  fall  into  such  a  blunder ;  he  had  no  hope  even  of  criticism, 
unless  it  was  to  be  based  on  accurate  psychology.  Contempt  for 
psychology  usually  implies  bad  psychology  ;  contempt  for  analysis, 


PERSUASION.  179 

bad  analysis.  Emphatically  is  it  so  with  Carlyla  Avowing  a 
contempt  for  analysis,  he  rushes  with  analytic  assertions  into 
regions  where  the  ablest  analyst  treads  with  caution,  and  commits 
blunders  that  the  poorest  analyst  would  be  ashamed  of.  We  had 
occasion  to  note  (p.  141)  his  view  about  the  association  of  intellect 
with  moral  worth,  and  of  a  sense  of  the  ridiculous  with  moral 
worth.  Take  this  other  statement  of  his  favourite  doctrine : — 

"  The  thinking  and  the  moral  nature,  distinguished  by  the  necessities  of 
speech,  have  no  such  distinction  in  themselves  ;  but  rightly  examined,  ex- 
hibit in  every  case  the  strictest  sympathy  and  correspondence;  are,  indeed, 
but  different  phases  of  the  same  indissoluble  unity — a  living  mind." 

Now,  here  the  division  into  thinking  nature  and  moral  nature 
is  an  analysis,  just  as  the  division  into  intellect  and  worth  and 
a  faculty  of  laughter  is  an  analysis.  These  are  distinguished,  he 
says,  by  the  necessities  of  speech ;  but  does  he  suppose  that  the 
psychologist  makes  any  other  than  a  verbal  distinction  ?  The 
difference  is  this:  the  scientific  analyst  distinguishes  with  care, 
common  speech  distinguishes  without  care.  To  prefer  the  com- 
mon-speech analysis  to  the  scientific,  is  to  prefer  unskilled  labour 
to  skilled  labour ;  amateur  analysis  is  not  likely  to  be  much  more 
valuable  than  amateur  shoemaking. 

Persuasion. 

Carlyle's  way  of  making  converts  is,  as  we  have  seen,  the  way 
of  the  declaiming  prophet,  not  of  the  supple  plausible  debater,  or 
of  the  solid  logician.  He  appeals  almost  exclusively  to  the  feel- 
ings, not  to  the  reason ;  and  issues  his  lamentations  and  denuncia- 
tions, his  Jeremiads  and  Isaiads,  without  the  slightest  attempt  to 
conciliate  opponents. 

His  oratory  is  employed  partly  on  political,  partly  on  moral 
subjects.  His  political  influence  has  been  insignificant,  smaller 
perhaps  than  has  been  exercised  by  any  political  adviser  of  mod- 
erate ability ;  his  moral  influence  has  been  considerable. 

What  chiefly  cripples  his  influence,  is  the  arrogant  tone  of  his 
assertions,  his  total  disregard  for  the  feelings  and  cherished  opin- 
ions of  those  addressed.  A  prophet  after  this  strain  can  win  over 
at  first  only  the  few  accidentally  predisposed  to  agree  with  him. 
With  these  few  all  his  grandeur  and  copiousness  is  overwhelming ; 
they  become  at  once  his  intense  admirers  and  adherents. 

For  bringing  over  such  as  are  not  prepared  to  jump  to  his  con- 
clusions, he  exerts  little  influence,  except  the  intrinsic  attractions 
of  his  style.  A  reader  is  disposed  to  view  with  favour  opinions 
clothed  in  a  vesture  so  brilliant :  in  admiring  the  fresh  original 
diction,  the  gorgeous  figures,  the  soaring  declamations,  the  vivid 
powers  of  description  and  narration,  one  is  in  danger  of  being  made 


180  THOMAS   CARLYLE. 

captive  to  the  doctrines.  With  those  that  do  not  admire  the  style, 
whose  teeth  are  set  on  edge  by  the  outrages  on  propriety  of  ex- 
pression, the  prophet's  force  tells  the  other  way.  To  many,  also, 
his  vituperative  eloquence,  in  spite  of  its  undercurrent  of  geniality, 
is  offensive.  With  readers  so  disposed  he  is  far  from  gaining 
ground ;  every  fresh  effusion  widens  the  breach. 

One  of  the  most  amiable  features  in  his  preaching  is  the  consol- 
ing of  the  humble  worker  under  difficulties.  He  has  many  ingeni- 
ous turns  of  thought  and  expression  for  coining  good  out  of  evil, 
and  beguiling  the  miserable  out  of  their  distresses.  He  comforts 
the  feeble  by  assuring  them  with  his  utmost  grandeur  of  language 
that  in  the  end  right  becomes  might ;  that  justice,  however  long 
delayed,  will  at  length  visit  the  oppressor.  He  contends  with 
Plato  that  the  victim  of  wrong  suffers  less  than  the  wrong-doer; 
and  talks  of  "  only  suffering  inhumanity  not  being  it  or  doing  it" 
If  a  man  has  genius,  "he  is  admitted  into  the  West-End  of  tJie 
Universe."  "  Man's  unhappiness  comes  of  his  greatness."  Had 
we  "  half  a  universe,"  "  there  would  still  be  a  dark  spot  in  our 
sunshine."  He  sets  the  performance  of  Duty  high  above  every 
other  consideration.  He  often  declaims  against  conventional  stand- 
ards of  respectability ;  and  cheers  the  poverty-stricken  with  such 
"wine  and  oil"  as  the  following  : — 

"  And  now  what  is  thy  property  ?  That  parchment  title-deed,  that  purse 
thou  buttonest  in  thy  breeches-pocket  ?  Is  that  thy  valuable  property  ? 
Unhappy  brother,  most  poor  insolvent  brother,  I  without  parchment  at  all, 
with  purse  oftenest  in  the  flaccid  state,  imponderous,  which  will  not  fling 
against  the  wind,  have  quite  other  property  than  that !  I  have  the  mirac 
breath  of  Life  in  me,  breathed  into  my  nostrils  by  Almighty  God." 


PART    IL 


ENGLISH    PROSE     WRITERS    IN 
HISTORICAL    ORDER. 


CHAPTER  L 


PROSE  WRITERS  BEFORE  1580. 
FOUBTEENTH    CENTTJBY. 

Sir  John  Mandeville,  1300-1371.— The  earliest  book  of  prose  able 
to  take  for  itself  a  place  in  our  literature,  was  a  book  of  Travels 
by  Sir  John  Mandeville. 

In  the  various  manuscript  collections  of  Early  English  composi- 
tions are  to  be  found  prose  fragments  written  before  Mandeville's 
work.  Some  of  these  have  been  printed  by  the  Early  English 
Text  Society — namely,  Homilies  of  the  Twelfth  and  Thirteenth 
Centuries ;  the  Ayenbyte  of  Inwyt,  illustrating  the  Kentish  dialect 
in  1340;  also,  from  a  MS.  of  the  fifteenth  century,  some  fragment* 
by  the  ascetic  Yorkshire  preacher,  Richard  Rolle  de  Hampole, 
who  died  in  1349.  But  these  fragments  are  inconsiderable ;  and 
seeing  that  they  had  not  vitality  enough  to  keep  themselves  alive, 
they  must  not  be  allowed  to  take  away  from  Mandeville  the 
honour  of  being  the  Father  of  English  Prose.  Mr  Henry  Morley 
calls  him  "our  first  prose  writer  in  formed  English,"  and  says 
"  that  with  him  and  Wiclif  begins,  at  the  close  of  the  period  of  the 
Formation  of  the  Language,  the  true  modern  history  of  English 
Prose." 

Mandeville  professes  to  write  what  he  had  seen  and  heard  in  the 
course  of  thirty-four  years  of  travel  in  the  East.  Nearly  all  that 
is  known  of  his  life  may  be  given  in  his  own  words : — 

"I,  John  Matmdevylle,  knyght,  alle  be  it  I  be  not  worthi,  that  was  born 
in  Englond,  in  the  Town  of  Seynt  Alboues,  passed  the  See  in  the  Zeer  of  our 
Lord  Jesu  Crist  MCCCXXII.,  in  the  day  of  Seynt  Michelle  ;  and  hidre  to 
have  ben  longe  tyme  over  the  See,  and  have  seyn  and  gon  thorghe  inanye 
dyverse  Londes,  and  many  Provynces  and  Kingdomes,  and  lies,  and  have 


184  PROSE   WRITERS  BEFORE    1580. 

passed  thorglie  Tartarye,  Percye,  Ermonye  the  litylle  and  the  grete ;  thorghe 
Lybye,  (JaMee,  and  a  gret  partie  of  Ethiope ;  thorghe  Amazoyne,  Inde  the 
iasse  and  the  more,  a  gret  partie  ;  and  thorghe  out  many  othere  lies,  that 
ben  abouten  Inde ;  where  dwellen  many  dyverse  Folkes,  and  of  dyverae 
Maneres  and  Lawes,  aud  of  dyverse  Schappes  of  Men." 

Besides  this,  we  know  that  before  leaving  England  he  studied 
physic,  a  branch  of  knowledge  that  the  traveller  would  find  service- 
able wherever  he  went.  He  is  said  to  have  returned  to  England 
in  1356,  and  to  have  then  written  his  book  in  Latin,  in  French, 
and  in  English : — 

"And  zee  schulle  undirstonde,  that  I  have  put  this  Boke  out  of  Latyn 
into  Frensche,  and  translated  it  azen  out  of  Frensche  into  Englyssche,  that 
every  man  of  my  Nacioun  may  undirstonde  it." 

His  book  completed,  he  seems  to  have  been  again  seized  with 
his  passion  for  travel.  He  is  said  to  have  died  at  Liege  in  1371. 

There  being  no  printing-press  in  England  till  the  last  quarter  of 
the  fifteenth  century,  Mandeville's  book  of  Travels  was  not  printed 
till  more  than  a  century  after  his  death  ;  but  immediately  upon  its 
composition,  it  began  to  circulate  widely  in  manuscript  It  was 
translated  into  Italian  by  Pietro  de  Cornero,  and  printed  at  Milan 
in  1480.  It  was  first  printed  in  England  in  1499,  when  an  edition 
was  issued  by  Wynkyn  de  Worde. 

Geoffrey  Chaucer,  1328-1400.— Of  the  '  Canterbury  Tales '  two 
are  in  prose — the  "Parson's  Tale"  and  the  "Tale  of  Melibceus." 
The  "  Parson's  Tale  "  is  a  long  and  somewhat  tedious  discourse  on 
the  Seven  Deadly  Sins ;  the  "  Tale  of  Meliboeus "  (and  his  wife 
Prudence)  is  an  allegory,  closely  translated  from  a  French  treatise. 
Neither  of  them  has  the  spirit  of  Chaucer's  verse,  and  they  would 
hardly  have  been  preserved  had  they  appeared  in  less  illustrious 
company. 

Besides  these  tales,  he  wrote  in  prose  a  translation  of  the  '  De 
Consolattone  Philosophise '  of  Boethius,  date  unknown ;  and  a 
'  Treatise  on  the  Astrolabe,'  addressed  to  his  son  Lewis,  conjectured 
date  1391. 

John  de  Wycliffe,  Wicliffe,  or  Wyclif,  the  Reformer,  1324-1384, 
although  he  wrote  mostly  in  Latin,  and  probably  wrote  little  in 
English  till  near  the  close  of  his  life,  was  the  most  eminent  and 
influential  writer  of  English  prose  in  the  fourteenth  century.  Mr 
Shirley's  conjecture  is  that  he  did  not  begin  to  use  the  vernacular 
in  controversy  till  after  the  great  Western  Schism  under  the  anti- 
pope  Clement  in  1378.  In  his  opinion  "half  the  English  religious 
tracts  of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  have  been  assigned 
to  him  in  the  absence  of  all  external,  and  in  defiance  of  all  internal 
evidence."  The  reader  maybe  referred  to  Mr  Arnold's  'Select 
English  Works  of  Wyclif '  for  examples  of  what  may  reasonably  be 


JOHN   DE   WYCLIFFE,   WICLIFFE,   OR   WYCLIF.  185 

ascribed  to  the  pen  of  the  great  reformer,  when  every  allowance 
is  made  for  the  extreme  difficulty  of  identifying  works  that  have 
remained  in  manuscript  till  within  recent  years.  Mr  Matthew's 
edition  for  the  English  Text  Society  of  certain  other  writings  may 
also  be  recommended,  as  well  for  the  interest  of  the  subjects,  as 
for  the  careful  and  thorough  introductory  biography. 

In  the  account  of  Wycliffe's  life,  prefixed  to  his  edition  of  the 
1  Fasciculi  Zizaniorum,'  Mr  Shirley  argued  strongly  against  several 
traditional  views.  One  of  his  chief  points  was  that  Wycliffe  has 
been  confounded  with  another  man  of  the  same  name,  and  that  it 
was  this  other  Wycliffe  whose  appointment  to  the  Wardenship  of 
Canterbury  Hall  in  1365  was  disputed,  and  finally  set  aside  by 
the  Pope.  This  theory,  however,  has  by  no  means  been  unani- 
mously adopted.  Mr  Matthew  follows  Lechler  in  rejecting  it 
Many  of  the  incidents  in  Wycliffe's  life  are  still  matter  of  dis- 
pute. He  was  a  Yorkshireman,  born  in  1324  at  Spreswell  or 
Ipswell,  near  Wyclif.  He  studied  at  Oxford  ;  but  no  particulars 
of  his  life  are  known  till  1361,  when  he  appears  as  Master  of 
Balliol.  In  this  year  he  was  presented  to  the  rectory  of  Fyling- 
ham  in  Lincolnshire,  and  shortly  after  went  there  to  reside.  In 
1363,  having  taken  a  doctor's  degree,  he  used  the  privilege  of 
lecturing  in  divinity  at  Oxford.  At  this  date  he  broached  no 
doctrinal  heresy,  but  assailed  abuses  in  Church  government,  especi- 
ally recommending  himself  to  the  Court  by  his  attacks  on  the  tem- 
poral power  of  the  Pope,  and  by  defending  Parliament's  refusal  to 
recognise  the  Pope's  claim  for  arrears  of  tribute.  In  1368,  to  be 
nearer  Oxford,  he  obtained  the  living  of  Ludgershall  in  Bucking- 
hamshire. In  1374  he  was  one  of  a  legation  sent  by  Edward  III. 
to  arrange  some  difficulties  with  the  Pope.  On  his  return  he  was 
presented  to  the  living  of  Lutterworth  in  Leicestershire,  which 
was  his  home  for  the  remainder  of  his  life.  From  1378  Mr  Shirley 
dates  a  new  stage  in  the  reformer's  career.  He  then  became  more 
exclusively  theological.  At  what  date  he  began  his  great  enter- 
prise of  translating  the  Bible  into  English  is  not  ascertained.  So 
long  as  he  attacked  only  the  pretensions  of  Church  dignitaries,  he 
was  supported  by  the  Court  against  their  attempts  at  revenge. 
But  when  in  1380  he  began  to  attack  the  doctrines  of  the  Church, 
and  proclaimed  his  heresy  on  transubstantiation,  the  Court  dared 
no  longer  support  him.  He  was  banished  from  Oxford  ;  and 
nothing  but  his  death  in  1384  could  have  saved  him  from  further 
persecutions. 

That  it  should  be  difficult  to  identify  Wycliffe's  writings  is  not 
to  be  wondered  at,  when  we  remember  that  in  those  days  tracts 
and  books  circulated  only  in  manuscript.  Wycliffe  towering  so 
high  above  other  theologians  of  the  time,  his  name  could  not  fail 
to  become  a  nucleus  for  all  writings  of  a  reforming  tenor.  His 


186  PROSE   WRITERS   BEFORE    1580. 

translation  of  the  Bible,  completed  in  1383,  and  used  as  the  basia 
for  subsequent  versions,  was  not  printed  for  centuries.  His  New 
Testament  first  .appeared  in  1731,  and  the  Old  Testament  was 
never  printed  till  so  late  as  1850. 

The  whole  of  the  New  Testament  is  said  to  be  by  Wycliffe's  own 
hand.  It  can  be  conveniently  seen  and  compared  with  other  early 
versions  in  Bagster's  '  English  Hexapla.'  Energy  and  graphic 
vigour  are  the  characteristics  of  his  controversial  prose. 

The  only  other  name  usually  mentioned  among  the  prose  writers 
of  the  fourteenth  century  is  John  de  Trevisa,  who  in  1387  trans- 
lated Higden's  '  Polychronicon.'  The  translation  was  printed  in 
1482  by  Caxton,  who  took  upon  him  "to  change  the  rude  and 
old  English  " — an  evidence  of  the  rapid  growth  of  the  language. 
Trevisa  is  said  to  have  made  other  translations  from  the  Latin. 
Of  a  translation  of  the  Scriptures  said  to  have  been  executed  by 
him  nothing  is  now  known. 

FIFTEENTH    CENTURY. 

Prose  writers  in  this  century  are  not  numerous,  and  their  works 
contain  little  to  tempt  anybody  but  the  antiquary.  Indeed,  up  to 
the  last  quarter  of  this  century  there  was  little  inducement  to  cul- 
tivate the  vernacular.  A  work,  as  we  have  said,  circulated  only 
in  manuscript ;  and  the  learned,  chiefly  clergymen,  addressed  their 
brethren  in  Latin.  The  following  are  the  most  famous  of  those 
that  wr"ote  in  the  mother  tongue. 

Reynold  Pecock,  1390-1460. — The  Bishop  of  Chichester  followed 
Wycliffe  in  denying  the  infallibility  of  the  Pope,  and  in  upholding 
the  Scriptures  as  the  sole  rule  of  faith.  He  also  questioned  the 
doctrine  of  transubstantiation.  He  opposed  the  persecution  of 
the  Lollards;  urged  that  the  Church  should  reason  them  out  of 
their  heresy,  not  burn  them ;  and  set  an  example  of  this  more 
humane  way  in  a  work  entitled  '  Represser  of  overmuch  blaming 
of  the  Clergy.'  This  curious  work  is  reprinted  in  the  Rolls  series, 
edited  by  Mr  Babington.  The  prose  style  is  much  more  formal 
and  less  homely  than  Wycliffe's,  being  elaborately  periodic.  When 
taken  to  task  for  his  heterodoxies,  he  recanted ;  and  thus  escaping 
martyrdom,  was  imprisoned  for  the  rest  of  his  life  in  Thoruey 
Abbey. 

Sir  John  Fortescue,  1395-1483. — Legal  and  political  writer, 
author  of  a  Latin  work,  '  De  Laudibus  Legum  Anglise '  (concern- 
ing the  excellence  of  the  laws  of  England),  and  an  English  work, 
'  The  Difference  between  an  Absolute  and  a  Limited  Monarchy,  as 
it  more  particularly  regards  the  English  Constitution.'  These  are 
perhaps  the  first  works  that  avow  in  their  title  the  strong  English 


JOHN   CAPGKAVE. — WILLIAM   CAXTON.  187 

pride  of  country.  The  one  extols  the  English  upon  the  ground  of 
their  civil  law,  and  the  other  sets  forth  the  superiority  of  the  Eng- 
lish people  to  the  French. 

In  his  'De  Laudibus,'  Fortescue  calls  himself  Cancellarius 
Anglice,  Chancellor  of  England ;  but  this  title  seems  to  have  been 
no  better  than  the  titles  conferred  by  James  VIII.  at  St  Germains. 
He  was  Chief-Justice  of  the  King's  Bench  in  the  reign  of  Henry 
VI.,  fled  with  that  prince  after  the  battle  of  Towton,  was  probably 
made  Chancellor  when  in  exile,  returned  with  Margaret  and  Prince 
Edward,  was  taken  prisoner  at  Tewkesbury  in  1471,  made  his  sub- 
mission to  Edward  IV.,  and  spent  the  close  of  his  life  in  retirement 
at  Ebrington  in  Gloucestershire. 

His  'Monarchy'  was  first  printed  in  1714  by  his  descendant, 
Baron  Fortescue,  the  friend  of  Pope.  The  '  De  Laudibus '  is  more 
famous;  it  was  translated  into  English  in  1516,  and  subsequently 
annotated  by  Selden,  the  antiquary. 

John  Oapgrave,  1393—,  born  at  Lynne,  educated  probably  at 
Cambridge,  made  Provincial  of  the  Order  of  Austin  Friars  in  Eng- 
land, was  one  of  the  most  learned  men  of  his  time,  a  voluminous 
author  in  Latin,  and  wrote  a  biography  and  a  chronicle  in  English. 
The  'Chronicle  of  England'  is  reprinted  in  the  Master  of  the  Rolls 
series  of  Chronicles.  It  begins  with  the  Creation,  and  is  distin- 
guished by -its  conciseness. 

William  Caxton,  the  Printer,  1420-1492.— Printing  was  intro- 
duced into  England  not  by  scholars,  but  by  an  enterprising  English 
merchant,  who  had  lived  for  more  than  thirty  years  in  Bruges,  then 
the  capital  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  and  a  great  centre  of  literary 
activity  as  well  as  trade.  Caxton  settled  in  Bruges  as  a  merchant, 
after  serving  his  apprenticeship  to  an  eminent  mercer  in  London  : 
rose  in  time  to  be  "  Governor  of  the  English  Nation,"  or  English 
Consul,  at  Bruges;  and  on  the  marriage  of  Edward  IV. 's  sister, 
Margaret,  with  Charles  of  Burgundy,  in  1468,  entered  her  service, 
probably  as  her  business  agent  Book-collecting  and  book-making 
had  been  for  years,  and  more  particularly  under  Philip  the  Good, 
an  ardent  fashion  at  the  Court  of  Burgundy.  Caxton  caught  the 
enthusiasm,  and  translated  into  English  a  version  of  the  '  History 
of  Troy,'  made  by  Le  Fevre,  one  of  the  royal  chaplains.  His  ver- 
sion was  admired.  He  was  asked  for  copies  of  the  work.  This 
turned  his  attention  to  the  art  of  printing — introduced  about  that 
time  into  Bruges  by  Colard  Mansion,  an  ingenious  member  of  the 
craft  of  book-copying.  It  occurred  to  him  apparently  that  it  would 
be  a  good  speculation  to  set  up  a  printing-press  in  London.  The 
first  book  issued  by  Caxton  that  bears  the  Westminster  imprint, 
was  a  translation  of  '  The  Dictes  and  Sayings  of  the  Philosophers' 
— "  enprynted  at  Westmestre,"  1477.  But  Mr  Blades,  the  great 
authority  on  the  subject,  puts  it  eighth  in  the  list  of  books  printed 


188  PROSE   WRITERS   BEFORE   1580. 

by  Caxton — the  '  History  of  Troy,'  and  six  others,  having  probably 
been  printed  by  him  abroad  before  his  resettlement  in  his  native 
country. 

Caxton's  printing-press  gave  an  immense  impulse  to  writing  in 
the  English  tongue.  In  the  first  ten  years  after  its  establishment, 
probably  more  English  was  written  for  publication  than  had  been 
written  in  the  two  preceding  centuries.  His  press  gave  to  the 
world  no  less  than  sixty-four  books,  nearly  all  in  English. 

His  publications  were  mostly  translations  from  French  and 
Latin,  many  of  them  made  by  himself.  They  include  religious 
books  of  a  popular  cast — '  Pilgrimage  of  the  Soul,'  '  The  Golden 
Legend '  (Lives  of  the  Saints),  '  The  Life  of  St  Catherine  of  Sens  : ' 
books  of  romance — Malory's  '  Mort  d'Artur,1  '  Godfrey  of  Boloyn,' 
*  The  Book  of  the  Order  of  Chivalry,'  «  The  History  of  the  Noble, 
Right  Valiant,  and  Right  Worthy  Knight  Paris,  and  of  the  Fair 
Vienne  : '  and  some  of  the  works  of  Chaucer,  Gower,  and  Lydgate. 
Caxton's  books  are  a  good  index  to  the  taste  of  the  time,  because 
he  published  as  a  man  of  business,  not  for  the  learned,  but  for  the 
general  reader  and  book-buyer.  He  was  a  fluent  translator  him- 
self, not  careful  of  his  style,  like  Bishop  Pecock,  for  example,  but 
rough  and  ready,  following  his  French  originals  in  idiom.  He 
spoke  with  quite  a  courtly  air  about  the  rude  old  English  of  the 
previous  century,  and  was  sharply  taken  to  task  by  Skelton  for  his 
presumption.  His  own  English  differs  somewhat  in  diction,  but 
not  so  much  in  the  words  used  as  in  the  greater  copiousness  of  ex- 
pression and  greater  abundance  of  French  idiom. 

Robert  Fabyan,  or  Fabian,  who  died  in  1512,  is  usually  counted 
among  the  authors  of  this  century.  His  '  Concordaynce  of  Stories,' 
generally  known  as  Fabyan's  Chronicle,  is  the  first  attempt  to  write 
history  in  English  prose.  An  alderman  and  a  sheriff  of  London, 
he  seems  to  have  pursued  literature  to  the  damage  of  his  business ; 
for  in  1502  he  withdrew  from  office  on  the  ground  of  poverty.  In 
all  likelihood  he  had  composed  his  Chronicle  after  his  retirement 
from  the  cares  of  official  life. 

The  Concordance,  compiled  from  older  sources,  as  the  name 
indicates,  narrates  the  history  of  Britain  from  the  landing  of 
Brutus  the  Trojan  down  to  1485.  It  is  most  minute  in  the  detail 
of  facts  and  fictions,  making  no  attempt  to  distinguish  between 
great  events  and  small.  One  of  its  most  authentic  records  is  a 
full  and  particular  account  of  the  successive  Lord  Mayors  of  Lon- 
don.— The  book  was  not  published  till  1516,  four  years  after  the 
author's  death. 

One  or  two  other  names  of  this  century  have  been  preserved. 
Juliana  Berners  (of  uncertain  date,  supposed  1390-1460}  deserves 
mention  as  the  first  of  her  sex  to  publish  a  book  in  English.  She 


JOHN  BOURCHIER. —  SIR  THOMAS  MORE.  189 

was  prioress  of  Sopewell  Nunnery,  near  St  Albans,  was — like  the 
gentlewomen  of  the  period — fond  of  hawking  and  hunting,  and 
wrote  a  treatise  on  these  sports.  Sir  Thomas  Malory  (fl.  1470) 
is  known  as  the  translator  and  compiler  of  the  '  History  of  King 
Arthur,'  printed  by  Caxton  in  1485.  To  this  century  belong  also 
translations  of  various  romances  from  the  French,  occupied  chiefly 
with  the  acts  of  the  Round  Table  Knights  and  the  Seer  Merlin; 
also  the  Paston  Letters,  supposed  date,  1422. 

PIBST   HALF  OP  SIXTEENTH  CENTURY. 

With  the  sixteenth  century  our  prose  literature  begins  a  new 
era,  though  the  writers  are  still  far  from  being  of  any  use  as  models 
of  style.  In  spite  of  the  encouragement  given  to  English  writing 
by  the  establishment  of  printing,  some  of  the  most  distinguished 
authors  of  the  time  wrote  chiefly  in  Latin,  being  ambitious  of  a 
wider  audience  than  the  English-reading  public.  The  high-minded 
Bishop  FISHER,  who  in  1535,  at  the  age  of  seventy-five,  was  put 
to  death  for  denying  the  king's  ecclesiastical  supremacy,  wrote 
copiously  in  Latin  in  defence  of  the  Catholic  tenets,  and  left  only 
a  few  sermons  in  English.  Bishop  BALE,  a  generation  later  (1495- 
1563),  a  champion  on  the  Protestant  side,  is  known  chiefly  by  his 
1  Lives  of  Eminent  English  Writers,  from  Japhet  down  to  1559,'  a 
work  written  in  Latin.  He  wrote  in  English  some  bitter  contro- 
versial tracts,  and  an  account  of  the  examination  and  death  of  the 
Protestant  martyr  Sir  John  Oldcastle.  Sir  Thomas  More  wrote 
his  '  Utopia '  in  Latin.  Still,  this  century  begins  with  a  greatly 
increased  activity  in  the  production  of  original  English  works. 

John  Bourchier,  Lord  Berners,  1474-1532,  is  known  chiefly  as 
the  translator  of  '  Froissart's  Chronicles.'  He  was  Chancellor  of 
the  Exchequer  and  Governor  of  Calais,  and  undertook  the  transla- 
tion, which  was  published  in  1523,  at  the  request  of  the  king.  It 
was  reprinted  in  1812  in  the  series  of  English  Chronicles.  Ber- 
ners made  one  or  two  other  translations  from  French  and  Spanish. 
As  an  educated  man  and  a  courtier,  he  wrote  without  pedantry  the 
best  English  of  the  time ;  and  by  that  time,  chiefly  under  Italian 
influence,  a  much  more  ornate,  balanced,  and  compact  style  began 
to  come  into  use.  If  we  compare  any  of  Caxton's  translations 
with  Berners's  Froissart,  we  are  struck  at  once  with  a  decided  ad- 
vance in  point  of  form.  By  the  end  of  Henry  VIIL's  reign,  we 
can  distinctly  see,  the  stylistic  tendency  which  reached  an  extrava- 
gant height  in  the  prose  of  John  Lyly. 

Sir  Thomas  More,  1480-1535,  first  layman  Chancellor  of  Eng- 
land, author  of  '  Utopia,'  is  perhaps  the  first  6f  our  writers  whose 
prose  displays  any  genius ;  and  his  '  Life  of  Edward  V.'  is  pro- 
nounced by  Mr  Hallam  to  be  "  the  first  example  of  good  English 


L90  PKOSE  WRITERS   BEFORE   1580. 

language,  pure  and  perspicuous,  well  chosen,  without  vulgarisms 
or  pedantry." 

More's  life  is  well  known  ;  he  ranks  with  Sir  Philip  Sidney  as 
one  of  the  most  popular  characters  in  our  history.  His  father  was 
Sir  John  More,  a  judge  of  the  Court  of  King's  Bench.  Admitted 
as  a  page  to  the  household  of  Cardinal  Morton  at  the  age  of  fifteen, 
he  was  sent  thence  to  Oxford,  where  he  made  the  acquaintance  of 
Erasmus.  Under  his  pleasant  exterior  there  was  a  vein  of  gravity 
and  asceticism  ;  and  after  leaving  Oxford  he  had  thoughts  of  be- 
coming a  monk.  This  desire  passed  away  ;  he  settled  down  to  the 
practice  of  the  law,  soon  rose  to  distinction,  was  made  under- 
sheriff  of  London,  and  obtained  a  seat  in  Parliament  in  1504.  He 
offended  Henry  VII.  by  opposing  a  subsidy ;  and,  retiring  from 
public  life,  probably  busied  himself  with  his  '  Life  of  Edward  V.,' 
till  the  accession  of  Henry  VIII.  let  him  resume  his  profession. 
With  Henry  he  became  a  great  favourite,  and  in  1529,  on  the  fall 
of  Wolsey,  was  made  Chancellor.  A  stanch  adherent  to  the  Church 
of  Rome,  he  is  said  to  have  practised  in  his  chancellorship  severities 
against  the  Reformers  very  inconsistent  with  the  theory  of  the 
4  Utopia.'  When  Henry  broke  with  Rome,  the  Chancellor  would 
not  follow  him,  and  suffered  death  rather  than  take  an  oath  affirm- 
ing the  validity  of  the  King's  marriage  with  Anne  Boleyn.  He 
was  beheaded  in  1535,  acting  up  to  his  Utopian  precept  that  a 
man  should  meet  death  with  cheerfulness. 

The  '  Utopia,'  written,  as  we  have  said,  in  Latin,  was  first 
printed  in  1516  at  Louvain.  His  principal  English  work  is  the 
'  Life  and  Reign  of  Edward  V.  and  of  his  Brother,  and  of  Richard 
III.,'  our  first  prose  composition  worthy  of  the  title  of  history. 
He  was  also  a  voluminous  writer  of  controversy,  publishing  more 
than  1000  pages  folio  against  Tyndale;  and  a  letter  to  his  wife 
that  has  chanced  to  be  preserved  is  often  quoted. 

The  '  Utopia,'  though  written  in  Latin,  is  always  reckoned  as 
an  English  work,  and  is  the  chief  support  of  More's  place  in  Eng- 
lish literature.  The  dramatic  setting  of  the  work  is  done  with 
great  ingenuity  and  humorous  circumstantiality.  More  professes 
to  be  only  a  transcriber ;  he  simply  writes  down  what  he  remem- 
bers of  a  conversation  with  a  restless  traveller,  Raphael  Hythloday. 
Ralph  had  met  in  his  travels  with  the  commonwealth  of  Utopia 
(Nowhere),  and  More  draws  him  out  to  give  an  account  of  it. 
Ralph  is  thus  an  earlier  Teufelsdroeckh,  as  Utopia  is  an  earlier 
Weissnichtwo.  Under  the  dramatic  guise,  disclaiming  all  respon- 
sibility for  the  opinions,  More  utters  freely  political  advice  that 
might  have  been  unpalatable  but  for  its  witty  accompaniments  of 
time,  place,  and  circumstance. 

The  work  is  full  of  graphic  personal  descriptions,  and  of  humour 
that  has  a  freshness  almost  unique  after  such  a  lapse  of  time.  As 


SIR  THOMAS   MORE.  191 

a  small  sample  of  his  picturesque  description,  take  the  first  appear 
ance  of  Hythloday.  On  leaving  church  at  Antwerp  one  day, 
sauntering  out — 

"  I  chanced  to  espy  this  foresaid  Peter  (Giles)  talking  with  a  certain 
stranger,  a  man  well  stricken  in  age,  with  a  black  sunburnt  face,  a  long 
beard,  and  a  cloak  cast  homely  about  his  shoulders,  whom  by  his  favour  and 
apparel  forthwith  I  judged  to  be  a  mariner." 

A  fair  specimen  of  his  humour  is  his  pretended  difficulties  in 
finding  out  exactly  where  Utopia  lay.  He  let  off  Raphael  without 
minute  questioning,  so  occupied  was  he  with  the  peculiarities  of 
the  place ;  then  he  wrote  to  his  friend  Giles,  who  found  the  travel- 
ler, and  asked  the  particulars  of  latitude  and  longitude ;  but  un- 
fortunately at  the  critical  moment  a  servant  came  and  whispered 
Raphael,  and  when  the  story  was  taken  up  again  after  this  inter- 
ruption, some  person  in  the  room  had  a  fit  of  coughing,  so  that 
Giles  lost  "  certain  of  the  words."  Throughout  Robinson's  trans- 
lation of  the  '  Utopia,'  the  translator  is  so  full  of  admiration  that 
he  cannot  refrain  from  marginal  remarks,  such  as,  "  O  wittie  head," 
"  a  prettie  fiction  and  a  wittie,"  "  mark  this  well." 

Of  late  years  the  '  Utopia '  has  been  sometimes  quoted  as  con- 
taining lessons  for  the  present  day.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  More 
gives  us  no  lesson  that  we  do  not  get  from  living  preachers  in 
forms  more  directly  adapted  to  our  time — the  main  pleasure  in 
reading  him  apart  from  his  humour  and  picturesqueness  is  the 
surprise  of  finding  in  the  'Utopia'  doctrines  that  have  been 
preached  in  these  latter  days  and  considered  novel.  Curiously 
enough,  the  chief  author  of  our  time  anticipated  by  the  "  merry, 
jocund,  and  pleasant"  More,  is  the  grimly  humorous,  vehement, 
and  defiant  "Seer  of  Chelsea,"  Mr  Carlyle.  The  difference  of 
manner  makes  the  coincidence  of  matter  all  the  more  striking. 
We  find  realised  in  the  'Utopia'  Mr  Carlyle's  main  political 
doctrines  :  his  hatred  of  idleness  and  love  of  steady  industry,  his 
model  aristocracy,  his  "  Captains  of  Industry,"  his  treatment  of 
malefactors,  and  his  grand  specific  for  an  overcrowded  country — 
emigration.  The  Utopians  are  a  sober,  industrious,  thrifty  people  ; 
jewellery  and  fine  clothes  they  put  away  with  childhood;  they 
have  no  idle  rich,  they  leave  hunting  to  the  butchers ;  the  chief 
duty  of  their  magistrates  the  Syphogrants  is,  "to  see  and  take 
heed  that  no  man  sit  idle ; "  they  enslave  their  malefactors,  give 
them  a  peculiar  dress,  cut  off  the  tips  of  their  ears,  hire  them  out 
to  work,  and  punish  desertion  with  death :  when  their  children 
become  too  numerous,  they  found  a  colony. 

All  this  is  a  curious  anticipation  of  the  '  Latter-Day  Pamphlets ' ; 
and  in  More  we  meet  with  many  other  things  that  we  are  accus- 
tomed to  think  peculiarly  modern.  He  makes  some  pleasant  play 


192  PKOSE  WEITERS   BEFORE   1580. 

on  the  pedantic  worship  of  antiquity,  and  the  over-honoured  "  wis- 
dom of  our  ancestors."  He  brings  against  the  capital  punishment  of 
theft  the  same  argument  that  Macaulay,  in  the  Indian  Penal  Code, 
urged  against  the  capital  punishment  of  rape.  Some  years  ago  we 
heard  much  about  the  depopulation  of  the  Highlands  of  Scotland 
to  make  deer-parks  :  More  has  a  similar  complaint  to  make ;  in 
his  day  the  high  price  of  English  wool  tempted  landlords  to  eject 
husbandmen,  and  turn  arable  land  into  sheep-pastures. 

The  'Utopia'  was  first  translated  by  Ralph  Robinson  in  1551. 
It  was  again  translated  by  Bishop  Burnet  in  1684.  Both  trans- 
lations have  often  been  reprinted,  and  others  have  been  made. 
Robinson's  translation  is  included  in  Arber's  series  of  'English 
Reprints,'  1869. 

If  we  compare  Robinson's  translation  with  the  original  or  with 
Burnet's  translation,  we  are  struck  with  a  peculiarity  characteristic 
of  our  literature  up  to  and  including  the  age  of  Elizabeth.  Robin- 
son seldom  translates  an  epithet  with  a  single  word ;  he  repeats 
two  or  even  three  words  that  are  nearly  synonymous.  It  would 
seem  as  if  he  distrusted  the  expressiveness  of  the  new  language, 
and  sought  to  convey  the  Latin  meaning  by  showing  it  in  as  many 
aspects  as  our  language  permitted.  "  Plain,  simple,  and  homely," 
"merry,  jocund,  and  pleasant,"  "disposition  or  conveyance"  of 
the  matter,  might  be  explained  in  this  way.  But  the  greater  num- 
ber of  the  tautologies  are  the  incontinence  arising  from  want  of 
art ;  couples  are  often  used  where  the  meaning  of  one  would  be 
amply  apparent :  thus — "  I  grant  and  confess,"  "  I  reckon  and 
account,"  "  tell  and  declare,"  "  win  and  get,"  and  so  forth. 

Sir  Thomas  Elyot,  1487-1546,  a  man  of  admired  integrity  and 
of  a  genial  didactic  turn,  who  was  employed  by  Henry  VIII.  on 
two  of  his  most  important  embassies,  was  a  miscellaneous  writer 
of  considerable  range.  His  most  famous  work  is  '  The  Governor,' 
which  deals  chiefly  with  the  subject  of  education.  Besides  this  he 
wrote  a  medical  and  dietetic  work,  '  The  Castle  of  Health,'  com- 
posed '  Bibliotbeca  Eliotae'  (probably  a  work  on  the  choice  of 
books),  and  pretended  to  translate  from  the  Greek  a  work  called 
*  The  Image  of  Governance.' 

With  More  and  Elyot  may  be  mentioned  their  friend,  though 
considerably  their  junior,  John  Leland  (1506-1552),  scholar  and 
antiquary,  author  of  '  The  Itinerary.' 

Edward  Hall,  1500-1547,  is  often  coupled  with  Fabyan  as  one 
of  the  two  beginners  of  English  prose  history.  The  title  of  his 
work  is  '  The  Union  of  the  two  Noble  and  Illustrious  Families  of 
Lancaster  and  Yorke.'  There  is  no  particular  reason  for  coupling 
him  with  Fabyan.  More  comes  between  them  as  a  historian  with 
his  Edward  V.  Hall  was  a,  man  of  better  education  than  Fabyan ; 
studied  at  Cambridge,  went  to  the  bar,  and  rose  to  be  one  of  tho 


GEORGE   CAVENDISH. — WILLIAM   TYNDALE.  193 

judges  of  the  sheriff's  court  His  style  is  not  equal  to  More's,  and 
better  than  Fabyan's. 

Sir  Roger  Ascham  says  that  in  "  Hall's  Chronicle  much  good 
matter  is  quite  marred  with  indenture  English  and  .  .  .  strange 
and  inkhorn  terms." 

The  work  was  reprinted  among  the  English  Chronicles  in  1809. 

George  Cavendish,  1495(?)-1562  (?),  gentleman-usher  to  Cardinal 
Wolsey,  and  after  Wolsey's  death  to  Henry  VilL,  wrote  a  biography 
of  the  Cardinal,  which  is  reprinted  in  Wordsworth's  '  Ecclesiastical 
Biography '  as  a  standard  authority.  Apart  from  its  own  worth, 
it  is  interesting  as  having  furnished  Shakspeare  with  particulars 
for  his  '  Henry  VIIL' 

An  edition,  published  by  Mr  Singer  in  1825,  was  accompanied 
with  a  proof  that  the  author  was  George  Cavendish,  and  not  Wil- 
liam, as  commonly  reported. 

John  Bellenden,  Ballenden,or  Ballentyne,  Archrlean  of  Moray, 
is  the  first  Scotch  writer  of  prose.  He  translated  Boece's  '  History 
of  Scotland'  (1536)  and  the  first  five  books  of  Livy.  His  diction 
is  very  little  different  from  the  ordinary  English  diction  of  that 
time. 

Translators  of  the  Bible.— Between  1537  and  1539  appeared 
in  rapid  succession  four  translations  of  the  Bible — Tyndale's,  Cover- 
dale's,  Matthew's,  and  Cranmer's. 

William  Tyndale,  1484-1536. — Translation  of  New  Testament, 
published  at  Antwerp,  1526. — Little  is  known  of  Tyndale's  family. 
He  was  a  native  of  Gloucestershire,  his  birthplace  probably  North 
Nibley.  He  was  educated  at  Oxford,  and  continued  there  prob- 
ably as  a  tutor  till  1519.  Thereafter,  being  tutor  in  the  family  of 
Sir  John  Walsh,  of  Little  Sodbury,  in  his  native  county,  his  anti- 
Popish  views  became  known,  exposed  him  to  threats  of  censure, 
and  finally  made  England  too  hot  for  him,  and  drove  him  to 
Hamburg,  1523-24.  Here  he  laboured  at  his  translation  of  the 
Scriptures,  holding,  with  the  reformers  of  Germany  and  Switzer- 
land, that  the  Bible  should  be  in  every  hand,  not  in  the  exclusive 
keeping  of  the  Church.  In  1524-25  he  printed  two  editions  of  the 
New  Testament  by  snatches  at  different  places,  subject  to  vexatious 
interruptions.  In  1526  an  edition  was  deliberately  printed  at 
Antwerp,  and  every  endeavour  used  to  smuggle  it  into  England. 
Turning  next  to  the  Old  Testament,  he  translated  the  five  books 
of  Moses,  which  he  published  in  1530.  He  revised  his  New  Testa- 
ment in  1534.  Hitherto  he  had  escaped  the  agents  sent  to  hunt 
him  out  and  apprehend  him.  At  last,  in  1535,  an  emissary  of  the 
English  Popish  faction  tracked  him  to  Antwerp,  obtained  a  war- 
rant from  the  Emperor,  and  lodged  him  in  prison.  In  1536  he 
was  led  to  the  stake  at  Antwerp,  strangled,  and  burnt  At  that 
very  time,  the  change  having  come  in  Henry's  relations  with  the 

N 


194  PROSE  WRITERS  BEFORE   1580. 

Pope,  the  King's  printer  in  London  was  printing  the  first  English 
edition  of  his  New  Testament. 

"  Tyndale's  translation  of  the  New  Testament  is  the  most  im- 

"  portant  philological  monument  of  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth 

"  century,  perhaps,   I  should  say,  of  the  whole  period  between 

"  Chaucer  and  Shakspeare,  both  as  a  historical  relic  and  as  having 

'  more  than  anything  else  contributed  to  shape  and  fix  the  sacred 

'  dialect,  and  establish  the  form  which  the  Bible  must  permanently 

'  assume  in  an  English  dress.     The  best  features  of  the  translation 

'of  1611  are  derived  from  the  version  of  Tyndale,  and  thus  that 

'  remarkable  work  has  exerted,  directly  and  indirectly,  a  more 

'  powerful  influence  on  the  English  language  than  any  other  single 

'  production  between  the  ages  of  Kichard  IL  and  Queen  Elizabeth." 

— (Marsh's  'Lectures  on  the  English  Language.') 

Miles  Coverdale,  1488-1569,  published  a  translation  of  the  whole 
Bible  in  1537.  His  life  was  more  prosperous  than  Tyndale's. 
Hardly  any  mention  is  made  of  him  before  the  date  of  his  transla- 
tion :  he  would  seem  to  have  worked  in  silence,  until  the  times 
became  favourable  to  open  activity  in  the  cause  of  the  Reformed 
faith.  He  was  made  Bishop  of  Exeter  in  1551.  During  the  reign 
of  Mary  he  prudently  retired  to  the  Continent,  returning  on  the 
accession  of  Elizabeth  to  his  former  dignity.  He  is  said  to  have 
been  a  native  of  Yorkshire.  His  version  of  the  New  Testament 
differs  but  slightly  from  Tyndale's.  He  also  wrote  several  tracts, 
now  much  in  request  among  book-hunters. 

Matthew's  Bible,  so  called  from  the  name  on  the  title-page,  was 
issued  under  the  superintendence  of  John  Rogers,  the  proto-martyr 
of  the  reign  of  Mary.  It  is  not  a  new  translation,  but  a  revised 
edition  of  Tyndale's  Pentateuch  and  New  Testament,  with  an 
amended  version  of  Coverdale's  translation  for  the  rest  of  the 
Bible.  Rogers  was  a  native  of  Warwickshire,  was  educated  at 
Cambridge,  and  became  the  disciple  and  friend  of  Tyndale  at 
Antwerp,  where  he  was  chaplain  to  the  English  merchants.  He 
married  a  German  wife,  and  left  ten  children. 

Cranmer's  Bible  (1540)  took  its  name  from  the  celebrated  Arch- 
bishop Cranmer,  1489-1556.  It  is  substantially  a  new  edition  of 
Matthew's,  revised  by  collation  with  the  original  Hebrew  and 
Greek. 

Hugh  Latimer,  1491-1555,  one  of  the  foremost  champions  of 
the  Reformation,  burnt  by  Queen  Mary  at  Oxford,  along  with 
Cranmer  and  Ridley.  He  was  born  at  Thurcaston  in  Leicester- 
shire, the  son  of  a  well-to-do  yeoman.  In  1505  he  was  sent  to 
Cambridge,  where  in  due  course  he  became  a  resident  Fellow. 
Always  vehement  and  enthusiastic,  he  distinguished  himself,  like 
another  Paul,  by  his  strong  attachment  to  the  prevailing  faith  and 
his  denunciations  of  the  new  light.  About  1521  he  was  converted 


HUGH  LATIMER.  195 

by  a  priest  whom  he  calls  "  Little  Bilney,"  and  immediately  made 
himself  obnoxious  to  "divers  Papists  in  the  University"  by  the 
new  direction  of  his  zealous  and  powerful  eloquence.  He  was 
brought  before  Wolsey,  but  the  Cardinal  found  nothing  amiss  in 
his  preaching,  and  sent  him  away  in  triumph.  When  Henry 
wished  to  invalidate  his  marriage  with  Catherine,  Latimer  sat 
upon  the  question  as  one  of  a  University  Commission,  and  decided 
in  the  King's  favour.  Soon  thereafter,  in  1530,  he  was  invited  to 
Count,  made  a  royal  chaplain,  and  in  1535,  on  the  elevation  of 
Cranmer  to  the  see  of  Canterbury,  Bishop  of  Worcester.  Never 
inclined  to  look  at  the  world  on  its  favourable  side,  he  signalised 
his  preferment  by  denouncing,  with  characteristic  vehemence,  the 
abuses  of  the  time,  declaring  that  "  bishops,  abbots,  priors,  parsons, 
canons  resident,  priests  and  all,  were  strong  thieves — yea,  dukes, 
lords,  and  all ; "  and  that  "  bishops,  abbots,  with  such  other,"  should 
"  keep  hospitality  to  feed  the  needy  people,  not  jolly  fellows  with 
golden  chains  and  velvet  gowns."  In  1539  he  got  into  trouble  for 
refusing  to  sign  the  six  Romanistic  articles,  resigned  his  bishopric, 
sought  to  retire  into  private  life,  but  was  seized,  put  in  the  Tower, 
and  "commanded  to  silence."  His  voice  is  not  heard  again  till 
the  reign  of  Edward  VI.,  when  he  blazes  out  as  the  most  stirring 
of  the  Reforming  preachers,  and  a  man  of  importance  at  Court. 
When  Edward  died,  everything  was  changed,  and  Latimer,  with 
other  conspicuous  Protestants,  suffered  the  last  extreme  of  perse- 
cution. 

Latimer's  sermons  are  still  read  with  interest  They  present  an 
extraordinary  contrast  to  modern  sermons.  In  those  days  the 
ministers  of  the  Word  did  not  confine  themselves  to  exegesis  and 
morality  in  the  abstract ;  they  addressed  hearers  by  name,  and 
singling  out  particular  classes,  told  them  with  some  minuteness 
how  to  regulate  their  lives.  Latimer  took  the  utmost  advantage 
of  this  licence  of  the  pulpit, — told  my  Lord  Chancellor  of  certain 
cases  that  he  should  attend  to  personally ;  warned  the  King 
against  having  too  many  horses,  too  many  wives,  or  too  much 
silver  and  gold ;  and  admonished  bishops  and  judges  of  their  duty 
in  the  plainest  terms.  This  was  not  all :  in  the  matter  he  prob- 
ably did  not  go  beyond  the  time ;  in  the  manner,  he  was  led  by 
his  excess  of  energy  into  eccentricities  of  diction  and  illustration 
rendered  tolerable  only  by  the  power  and  freshness  of  his  genius. 
His  contemporaries  looked  upon  him  much  as  the  present  genera- 
tion looks  on  Thomas  Carlyle.  Many  could  not  endure  his  open 
defiance  of  conventionality,  and  could  not  speak  of  him  with 
patience.  These  he  outraged  still  more  by  replying  to  them  from 
the  pulpit  He  says — 

"When  I  was  in  trouble,  it  was  objected  and  said  unto  me  that  I  was 
singular,  that  110  man  thought  as  I  thought,  that  I  loved  a  singularity  in 


196  PEOSE   WRITERS   BEFORE    1580. 

all  that  I  did,  and  that  I  took  a  way  contrary  to  the  King  and  the  whole 
Parliament,  and  that  I  was  travailed  with  them  that  had  better  wits  than 
I ;  that  1  was  contrary  to  them  all. " 

He  then  goes  on  to  compare  his  case  with  Christ's,  and  draws 
a  humorous  ironical  parallel  between  himself  and  Isaiah,  with  a 
quaint  drollery,  almost  buffoonery,  not  likely  to  conciliate  those 
already  offended  by  his  eccentric  power. 

He  is  often  praised  for  his  "  vigorous  Saxon."  It  is  undoubtedly 
vigorous,  and  his  illustrations  have  the  stamp  of  genius.  But  to 
his  cultivated  hearers,  the  homely  turns  must  have  sounded  like 
Yorkshire  or  broad  Scotch  in  a  modern  discourse.  It  is  not  to  be 
supposed  that  the  Court  of  Edward  VI.  heard  the  following  with- 
out a  srnile : — 

"In  the  VII.  of Jhon  the  Priests  sent  out  certain  of  the  Jews  to  bring 
Christ  unto  them  violently.  When  they  came  into  the  temple  and  heard 
Him  preach,  they  were  so  moved  with  His  preaching  that  they  returned 
home  again  and  said  to  them  that  sent  them,  Nunquam  sic  locutiis  est  homo 
ut  hie  homo.  There  was  never  man  spake  like  this  man.  Then  answered 
the  Pharisees,  Num  et  vos  seducti  estia  ?  What,  ye  brain-sick  fools,  ye  hoddy 
peck*,  ye  doddy  polls,  ye  huddes,  do  ye  believe  Run  ?  Are  you  seduced  also  ?  " 

Or  the  following : — 

"  Germany  was  visited  XX.  years  with  God's  Word,  but  they  did  not 
earnestly  embrace  it,  and  in  life  follow  it,  but  made  a  mingle-mangle  and  a 
hotch-potch  of  it. 

"  I  cannot  tell  what,  partly  Popery,  partly  true  religion,  mingled  together. 
They  say  in  my  country  when  they  call  their  hogs  to  the  swine  trough : 
'  Come  to  thy  mingle-mangle ;  come  pyr,  come  pyr,' — even  so  they  made 
mingle-mangle  of  it." 

Latimer's  "  Sermon  on  the  Plougher,"  and  his  "  Seven  Sermons 
before  Edward  VI.,"  are  in  Arber's  series  of  English  Reprints. 
Several  editions  of  his  sermons  were  issued  in  the  sixteenth 
century. 

John  Foxe,  1517-1587,  author  of  the  'Book  of  Martyrs,'  a 
native  of  Lincolnshire.  Having  studied  at  Oxford  and  gained 
a  fellowship,  he  became  openly  Protestant,  and  was  expelled  in 
1545.  After  various  distresses,  he  had  been  but  a  short  time 
comfortably  settled  as  tutor  to  the  Earl  of  Surrey  when  Mary  as- 
cended the  throne,  and  he  had  to  flee  to  the  Continent  and  support 
himself  by  correcting  proofs.  After  Mary's  death  he  returned  and 
was  made  a  prebendary.  His  '  Book  of  Martyrs '  is  an  interesting 
record,  reprinted  by  various  religious  societies :  the  facts  are  not 
much  to  be  relied  on,  being  based  upon  popular  report,  evidently 
little  sifted. 

Sir  John  Cheke,  1514-1557,  Professor  of  Greek  at  Cambridge, 
is  best  known  by  the  impulse  he  gave  to  the  study  of  Greek.  His 
life  was  troubled;  he  had  difficulties  with  Gardiner  about  certain 


THOMAS   WILSON. — ROGER  ASCHAM.  197 

innovations  in  the  pronunciation  of  Greek,  and  on  the  accession  of 
Mary  had  to  flee  the  country  for  his  religion.  After  some  years' 
precarious  wandering,  he  was  caught  at  Antwerp  and  brought 
back ;  was  offered  the  alternative  of  recantation  or  death ;  re- 
canted, and  soon  after  died  of  shame  and  grief. 

His  only  English  work  is  written  against  the  insurrection  of  Ket 
the  Tanner.  Its  title  is,  '  The  Hurt  of  Sedition,  how  grievous  it  is 
to  a  Commonwealth.' 

THIRD   QUARTER   OP   SIXTEENTH   CENTURY. 

About  the  beginning  of  this  period  we  find  a  marked  develop- 
ment of  prose  style.  It  begins  to  be  more  generally  a  subject 
of  special  study.  Teachers  in  high  places  begin  to  theorise  on 
the  essentials  of  polite  writing. 

Thomas  Wilson,  d.  1581,  published  an  'Art  of  Logic'  in  1552, 
an  '  Art  of  Rhetoric '  in  1553.  The  latter  is  the  first  treatise  on 
English  composition.  Wilson  was  a  man  of  position,  said  to  have 
been  Dean  of  Durham,  and  to  have  held  offices  of  state  under  Eliza- 
beth. He  was  not  a  dry  and  formal  writer,  but  aimed  at  conveying 
instruction  in  an  easy,  familiar,  and  courtly  style,  expressly  eschew- 
ing the  terms  of  the  schools.  In  this  respect  he  often  reminds 
us  of  Addison  and  the  polite  writers  of  Queen  Anne's  time.  His 
'  Rhetoric '  embraces  much  more  than  the  mere  art  of  composi- 
tion. It  is  a  familiar  treatise  on  the  lines  of  Quintilian's  rhetoric, 
such  as  might  be  written  for  the  instruction  of  a  young  nobleman 
preparing  to  take  a  part  in  public  life,  the  didactic  being  relieved 
by  witty  anecdotes.  It  deals  with  a  good  style  among  other 
requisites  of  oratorical  success.  Wilson  made  a  stand  for  the 
purity  of  the  "  King's  English."  l  He  ridiculed  fops  and  scholars 
for  talking  Chaucer,  and  for  larding  their  speech  with  French- 
English,  with  Italianated  terms,  with  inkhorn  terms,  with  "  far- 
fetched colours  of  gay  antiquity."  "The  unlearned  or  foolish 
fantastical  .  .  .  will  so  Latin  their  tongues  that  the  simple 
.  .  .  think  surely  they  speak  by  some  revelation." 

Roger  Ascham,  1515-1568,  is  one  of  the  best-known  men  of  hia 
century.  He  was  more  fortunate  in  his  life  than  More,  Latimer,  or 
Cheka  He  enjoyed  a  pension  under  Henry  and  Edward,  had  his 
pension  not  only  continued  but  increased  by  Mary,  was  made  her 
Latin  Secretary  ;  after  her  death  became  a  favourite  with  Elizabeth, 
continued  to  enjoy  pension  and  secretaryship,  taught  Latin  and 
Greek  to  the  learned  Queen,  and  lived  to  write  that,  "  in  our  fore- 
fathers' time,  Papistry  as  a  standing  pool  covered  and  overflowed 
all  England."  The  secret  of  his  success  was,  that  he  held  no 
strong  opinions  in  religion,  or,  at  any  rate,  kept  them  to  himself. 
When  at  Cambridge  he  nearly  lost  his  fellowship  by  indiscreetly 
1  He  is,  so  far  as  we  are  aware,  the  first  writer  to  use  this  expression. 


198  PROSE  WRITERS  BEFORE   1580. 

speaking  against  the  Pope.  Escaping  shipwreck  that  time,  he  was 
careful  never  to  offend  again  by  an  obtrusive  profession  of  his 
faith.  A  Yorkshireman,  son  of  Lord  Scroop's  steward,  he  had 
little  of  the  Yorkshire  vigour ;  a  man  of  delicate  constitution,  of 
gentle  and  polished  manners ;  noted  for  his  fine  penmanship  and 
elegant  scholarly  acquirements,  and  having  not  a  little  of  the 
dexterity  of  the  courtier. 

The  "Toxophilus '  (1545)  is  a  dialogue  on  archery,  sustained  by 
Philologus  and  Toxophilus — Lover  of  the  Book,  and  Lover  of  the 
Bow.  It  gives  the  history  of  the  bow,  compares  archery  with 
other  recreations,  recommends  it  as  an  exercise  for  the  student, 
tells  the  best  kind  of  wood  for  the  bow,  discusses  the  art  of  shoot- 
ing, &c. ;  above  all,  it  declares  what  England  owes  to  the  bow,  and 
urges  every  Englishman  to  practise  the  national  weapon.  Upon 
the  merits  of  this  side  of  the  treatise  he  received  his  pension  from 
Henry.  The  'Schoolmaster'  (published  in  1570,  after  his  death) 
discusses  the  readiest  means  of  acquiring  a  knowledge  of  Latin, 
and  criticises  the  style  of  Varro,  Sallust,  Cicero,  and  Caesar.  In 
both  '  Toxophilus '  and  the  '  Schoolmaster  '  he  takes  great  liberty 
of  digression,  but  does  little  to  redeem  his  promise  of  great  things 
under  modest  titles.  He  announced  a  '  Book  of  the  Cockpit,'  in 
defence  of  his  frequenting  that  place  of  amusement,  but  the  work 
was  never  published.  His  chief  service  to  English  prose  is  the 
example  he  sets,  as  a  scholar  and  a  courtier,  of  writing  in  the 
vernacular.  This  service  is  acknowledged  by  Dr  Nathan  Drake. 
Thomas  Fuller  says  of  him — "  He  was  an  honest  man,  and  a  good 
shooter.  Archery  was  his  pastime  in  youth,  which,  in  his  old  age, 
he  exchanged  for  cock-fighting.  His  '  Toxophilus '  is  a  good  book 
for  young  men ;  his  '  Schoolmaster '  for  old  ;  his  '  Epistles '  for  ail 
men." 

A  collected  edition  of  his  English  works  was  published  in  1761. 
Another  reprint  in  1815  is  modernised,  not  only  in  the  spelling  but 
in  the  language. 

Sir  Thomas  North,  a  collateral  ancestor  of  the  Guilford  family, 
issued  in  1579  an  English  version  of  '  Plutarch's  Lives,'  rendered 
from  the  French  translation  by  Amyot.  The  work  was  very 
popular,  until  superseded  by  Dryden's  translatioa  It  is  closely 
followed  by  Shakspeare  in  '  Coriolanus,'  'Julius  Caesar,'  and  '  An- 
tony and  Cleopatra.'  An  earlier  work  of  his — the  '  Dial  of 
Princes,'  a  translation  of  Guevara's  '  El  Libro  de  Marco  Aurelio,' 
published  in  1557 — is  still  more  interesting  for  the  history  of 
prose  style.  It  throws  strong  light  on  the  derivation  of  Lyly's 
Euphuism  (see  p.  229).  There  are  passages  in  it  that  might  pass 
for  Lyly's. 

Holinshed's  'Chronicle,'  published  about  1580,  is  known  to 
many  readers  only  from  its  being  utilised  by  Shakspeare,  who 


HOLINSHED.  199 

made  Holinshed's  translation  of  Boece  the  basis  of  '  Macbeth.' 
In  the  composition  of  his  '  Chronicles,'  which  profess  to  be  a  com- 
plete history  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  Holinshed,  himself  a 
man  of  uncertain  biography,  had  several  assistants,  whose  lives  are 
equally  obscure.  The  prefatory  account  of  England  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  the  most  valuable  part  of  the  work,  was  written 
by  William  Harrison ;  the  history  and  description  of  Ireland  by 
Richard  Stanihurst.  John  Hooker,  the  Chamberlain  of  Exeter, 
and  uncle  of  "  the  judicious  Hooker,"  is  also  said  to  have  given 
aome  assistance. 


CHAPTER    II. 


FROM    1580   TO    1 6 10. 


SIB     PHILIP    SIDNEY, 

I554—I586. 

IN  the  prose  works  of  Sir  Philip  Sidney  we  discern  an  advance  on 
the  style  of  all  preceding  writers.  The  advance  is  not  perhaps 
great : — we  are  not  to  suppose  that  prose  style  departed  from  the 
usual  law  of  gradual  progress  : — still,  whatever  the  difference  may 
be  in  the  ultimate  analysis,  undeniably  his  prose  is  nearer  the 
present  style  of  English  than  any  prose  of  anterior  date.  His 
style  has  a  flow  and  elevation  not  to  be  found  in  any  prose  work 
before  his  tima  On  that  ground,  although  he  is  "  a  warbler  of 
poetic  prose,"  his  literary  fame  resting  chiefly  on  a  romance,  it  is 
desirable  to  analyse  his  style  simply  as  a  prose  style  at  some  length. 
As  the  "  Hero  of  Zutphen,"  Sidney  is  one  of  the  most  popular 
characters  in  English  history;  and  in  his  own  day,  at  a  very  early 
age,  was  celebrated  all  over  Europe  for  his  discretion,  courage,  and 
accomplishments.  It  is  said  that  he  was  mooted  as  a  candidate 
for  the  throne  of  Poland,  and  that  Elizabeth  put  her  veto  on  the 
rising  negotiation,  because  she  could  not  part  with  "  the  jewel  of 
her  time."  He  was  born  at  Pensliurst  in  Kent;  son  of  Sir  Henry 
Sidney — a  knight  who  became  a  favourite  with  Elizabeth,  and  was 
famed  as  an  administrator  of  Ireland  ;  and  nephew  to  the  Earl  of 
Leicester.  He  was  educated  at  Shrewsbury,  and  at  Christ  Church, 
Oxford.  In  1572,  at  the  age  of  seventeen,  he  set  out  with  three 
years'  leave  of  absence  to  travel  on  the  Continent ;  was  in  Paris 
during  the  massacre  of  St  Bartholomew,  and  went  thence  to 
Frankfort,  Vienna,  and  the  chief  cities  of  Italy.  During  these 


SIR  PHILIP  SIDNEY.  201 

travels,  unlike  most  travellers  of  his  rank,  he  associated  with 
scholars  and  statesmen,  making  an  earnest  study  of  European 
politics.  Introduced  at  Court  in  1575,  his  mixed  courtesy  and 
gravity  at  once  made  him  a  favourite.  In  1577,  at  the  age  of 
twenty-two,  being  sent  as  ambassador  in  great  state  to  congratu- 
late the  new  Emperor  of  Germany,  and  discover  as  far  as  possible 
his  tendencies,  he  met  William  the  Silent  of  Orange,  who  pro- 
nounced him  one  of  the  ripest  statesmen  in  Europe.  During  the 
eight  following  years,  he  had  no  public  employment,  and  lived 
chiefly  at  Court  In  1578  he  wrote  his  masque  'The  Lady  of 
the  May,'  performed  at  Elizabeth's  reception  by  his  uncle  the 
Earl  of  Leicester.  Probably  about  the  same  time  he  began  his 
sonnets  to  '  Stella,'  the  daughter  of  the  Earl  of  Essex,  afterwards 
married  to  Lord  Rich.  In  the  same  year  he  had  Spenser  living 
with  him  at  Penshurst  In  1580  he  wrote  the  'Arcadia,'  dedi- 
cated to  his  celebrated  sister,  the  Countess  of  Pembroke.  In 
the  following  year  he  is  supposed  to  have  written  the  '  Apologie 
for  Poetrie.'  After  this  he  became  too  much  engaged  in  politics 
to  have  time  for  literature.  As  a  statesman,  he  devoted  himself 
to  the  policy  of  humbling  the  power  of  Spain.  He  had  boldly 
written  to  Elizabeth  in  1580,  dissuading  her  from  the  marriage 
with  Anjou,  and  now  he  was  eager  that  the  Queen  should  take 
active  part  with  the  Continental  Protestants.  This  not  being  done, 
he  impatiently  planned  with  Drake  a  secret  expedition  to  strike  at 
the  Spanish  colonies  in  America,  but  was  interdicted  just  at 
starting.  At  last  Elizabeth  resolved  to  stir,  and  in  the  fall  of 
1585  sent  him  to  the  Netherlands  as  Governor  of  Flushing  along 
with  an  army  under  Leicester.  Commencing  operations  in  spring, 
Sidney  showed  great  enterprise  and  skill,  but  was  mortally  wounded 
in  a  rencounter  at  Zutphen,  and  died  Oct.  17,  1586.  The  touch- 
ing incident  that  has  endeared  his  memory,  and  made  him  known, 
to  every  schoolboy,  occurred  as  he  rode  wounded  from  the  battle. 

Though  he  was  well  known  as  a  writer,  and  widely  esteemed  as 
a  patron  of  literary  men  during  his  life,  none  of  his  works  were 
published  till  after  his  death.  The  '  Arcadia '  was  first  printed 
in  1590,  the  '  Apologie  for  Poetrie'  in  1595. 

In  personal  appearance  Sidney  was  tall  and  handsome,  with 
clear  complexion,  and  hair  of  a  dark  amber  colour.  By  Spenser's 
testimony  he  excelled  in  athletic  sports — "  in  wrestling  nimble, 
and  in  running  swift;  in  shooting  steady,  and  in  swimming  strong; 
well  made  to  strike,  to  throw,  to  leap,  to  lift."  He  was  of  such 
prowess  in  the  tournament,  that  on  the  occasion  of  a  great  festival 
he  was  selected  as  one  of  four  champions  to  keep  the  lists  .in  hon- 
our of  England  against  all  comers. 

It  is  not  often  that  we  find  in  union  with  such  physical  prowess 
any  remarkable  powers  of  mind.  In  Elizabeth's  Court  there  were 


202  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

many  able  men  both  physically  and  mentally,  but  none  of  those 
that  were  a  match  for  Sidney  in  the  tournament  could  have 
written  the  '  Arcadia  '  or  the  '  Apology  for  Poetry.'  Even  in  his 
healthy  active  boyhood  Sidney  was  remarkably  studious ;  "  his 
talk,"  says  his  schoolfellow  Fulke  Greville,  "  ever  of  knowledge, 
and  his  very  play  tending  to  enrich  the  mind."  When  he  grew  to 
manhood,  his  sagacity  in  practical  affairs  soon  won  him  golden 
opinions  from  more  than  one  veteran  statesman.  If  we  look  to 
his  writings,  we  find  abundant  proofs  of  intellectual  vigour.  Hia 
diction  is  copious  and  felicitous,  unmistakably  significant  of  mental 
quickness  and  force.  In  his  '  Arcadia '  we  are  constantly  struck 
with  the  extreme  volatility  and  subtlety  of  his  fancy.  In  the 
Apology,  along  with  a  similar  sprightliness,  we  meet  with  pas- 
sages suggestive  of  more  solid  power.  In  defending  poetry  against 
the  Puritans,  it  shows  considerable  rhetorical  perspicacity  to 
claim  the  Psalms  of  David  as  "  divine  poems."  And  there  is  no 
small  discernment  in  his  maintaining  that  a  poem  might  be  writ- 
ten in  prose ;  that  "  verse  is  but  an  ornament  and  no  cause  to 
poetry."  Taken  all  in  all,  his  works  bear  evidence  of  versatile, 
fresh,  and  vigorous  intellect,  and  support  what  is  recorded  of  his 
adroit  courtesy  and  sagacious  observation  of  affairs. 

As  regards  his  emotional  character,  were  we  to  judge  solely  from 
his  writings,  we  should  take  him  to  have  been  a  man  of  ebullient 
spirits,  tempered  by  extraordinary  sweetness  and  warmth  of  dis- 
position. This  is  the  impression  left  by  the  soft  exuberant  humour 
of  the  Apology,  and  its  strong  expressions  of  delight  in  the 
works  of  the  poet.  He  seems  to  have  been  a  pleasant  companion, 
although  not  of  the  rollicking,  pleasure-loving  temper  that  per- 
petually craves  for  society.  Gay  with  the  gay  among  his  boon 
companions,  he  could  also  be  serious  with  the  serious.  He  loved 
to  exchange  thoughts  in  private  colloquy  with  such  men  as  Languet 
and  Spenser.  At  times  he  courted  solitude,  and  would  even  seem 
to  have  undergone  fits  of  melancholy  and  despondency,  as  when, 
before  leaving  England  for  the  last  time,  he  expressed  a  presenti- 
ment that  he  should  never  return.  To  the  creations  of  art  he 
turned  with  ever  fresh  delight.  He  was  not  an  optimist ;  he  did 
not  find  enduring  satisfaction,  abundant  means  of  enjoyment,  in 
the  actual  world ;  he  took  refuge  from  facts  in  the  regions  of 
imagination — "  Nature's  world,"  he  said,  "  is  brazen,  the  poet's 
only  golden."  The  ruling  emotion  in  his  creative  efforts,  as  we 
shall  see  when  we  come  to  analyse  the  qualities  of  his  style,  is 
tenderness — not  the  wild  passionate  tenderness  of  the  Celtic  nature, 
but  a  soft  and  courtly  phase  of  the  emotion.  His  imagination  did 
not  dwell  sadly  upon  the  sorrowful  side  of  life,  but  joyfully  spent 
itself  in  playful  humour,  in  graceful  fancies,  in  pictures  of  beautiful 
women  and  beautiful  scenery,  and  in  deeds  of  romantic  devotion. 


SIR  PHILIP   SIDNEY.  203 

The  'Arcadia'  gives  little  evidence  of  delight  in  tlie  mere  excite- 
ment of  power.  It  contains  great  variety  of  incidents  and  char- 
acters ;  but  everything  is  transfigured  by  the  all-pervading  sweet- 
ness and  warmth — everything  is  seen  through  this  atmosphere. 
His  heroes — young  men  of  irresistible  prowess — are  beautiful  as 
gods.  In  recounting  their  most  valiant  achievements,  he  never 
suffers  us  to  forget  that  they  are  in  love ;  either  they  are  fighting 
to  rescue  their  fair  ladies,  or  the  ladies  are  listening  with  admira- 
tion to  the  story  of  their  brave  adventures.  If  he  enters  with 
spirit  into  the  description  of  a  storm,  a  battle,  a  tournament,  a 
duel,  a  popular  tumult,  or  the  speeches  at  a  trial,  not  only  does 
he  mingle  pretty  fancies  with  his  description  or  narrative,  but  he 
seldom  keeps  long  out  of  view  the  tender  interests  at  stake. 

Men  so  lavishly  endowed  otherwise  as  Sidney,  with  such  capaci- 
ties and  self-contained  means  of  enjoyment,  are  often  indifferent 
to  the  aims  of  ambition,  and  even  rash  and  imprudently  generous. 
A  less  bountiful  natural  outfit  is  more  serviceable  for  rising  and 
remaining  high  in  the  world.  He  did  not  push  for  favour  and 
office  at  Court :  a  slight  rebuff  drove  him  to  the  country ;  and  he 
might  have  spent  his  life  in  retirement  had  not  his  foreign  friend 
Languet  impressed  him  with  the  gravity  of  the  political  situation 
in  Europe,  and  urged  him  to  take  a  part.  Once  resolved  upon  a 
course  of  action,  he  moved  with  fearlessness  and  vigour.  Few 
men  would  have  ventured  on  his  bold  remonstrance  to  Elizabeth 
against  the  French  marriage.  Naturally  sweet-tempered,  he  was 
haughty  and  imperious  when  provoked,  and  ready  to  put  out  his 
hand  to  execute  his  will :  witness  his  giving  the  lie  to  the  Earl  of 
Oxford,  his  challenge  to  the  unknown  asperser  of  his  uncle  Leices- 
ter, and  his  threatening  to  "  thrust  his  dagger  into  "  poor  secretary 
Molyneux,  whom  he  suspected  of  tampering  with  his  letters.  He 
owed  his  death  to  an  impulse  of  romantic  generosity.  The  Lord 
Marshal  happening  to  enter  the  field  of  Zutphen  without  greaves, 
Sidney  cast  off  his  also,  to  put  his  life  in  the  same  peril,  and  so 
exposed  himself  to  the  fatal  shot 

The  opinions  of  the  Apology  call  for  some  notice.  It  is  a  light 
humorous  production,  with  here  and  there  flashes  of  lofty  beauty; 
but  beneath  all  this,  there  is  a  foundation  of  serious  doctrine.  The 
author  is  full  of  humour  and  eloquence  in  behalf  of  the  delights  of 
poetry,  but  he  shows  also  a  serious  interest  in  the  cause,  a  genuine 
zeal  to  convince  and  convert.  Very  much  contrary  to  the  modern 
theory  that  makes  the  "  interpretation  of  nature  "  the  poet's  chief 
end,  is  the  saying  above  quoted,  that  "  nature's  world  is  brazen, 
the  poet's  only  golden."  "  Nature  never  set  forth  the  earth  in 
so  rich  tapestry  as  divers  poets  have  done,  neither  with  pleasant 
rivers,  fruitful  trees,  sweet-smelling  flowers,  nor  whatsoever  else 


204  FKOM   1580  TO   1610. 

may  make  the  too  much  loved  earth  more  lovely."  He  eloquently 
defends  the  usefulness  of  poetry :  it  furnishes  speaking  pictures  of 
virtue  more  perfect  than  even  history  can  show ;  to  make  vice 
attractive  is  the  abuse  and  not  the  use  of  poetry.  To  those  that 
accuse  poets  of  lying,  he  ingeniously  answers  that  they  affirm 
nothing  as  true,  and  therefore  cannot  lie. 

His  criticisms  of  existing  English  poetry  show  a  fine  tasta  He 
objects  to  outrageous  infraction  of  the  unities  (see  p.  212);  to 
violent  mixture  of  serious  and  comic  — "  your  mongrel  tragi- 
comedy;"— and  to  making  ridicule  of  human  weakness,  of  "an 
extreme  show  of  doltishness,"  or  of  "  strangers  because  they  speak 
not  English  as  we  do."  He  objects  also  to  Lyly's  surfeit  of  simil- 
itudes, accusing  him  of  "  rifling  up  all  Herbarists,  all  stories  of 
Beasts,  Fowls,  and  Fishes,"  which,  he  says,  is  "  an  absurd  surfeit 
to  the  ears,"  "rather  overswaying  the  memory  than  any  whit 
informing  the  judgment." 

ELEMENTS   OP   STYIA 

Vocabulary. — "It  is  marvellous,"  says  Mr  William  Stigant, 
author  of  an  essay  on  Sidney  in  the  '  Cambridge  Essays '  for  1858, 
"with  what  a  delicate  tact  he  had  divined  the  capacity  of  the 
English  language  for  prose  composition,  and  how  few  obsolete 
•words  he  has  made  use  of,  writing  in  advance  of  the  great  Eliza- 
bethan epoch.  He  reads  indeed  more  modern  than  any  author  of 
that  century."  Sidney  escapes  free  from  Thomas  Wilson's  cen- 
sure;  his  terms  are  neither  French,  nor  Italianate,  nor  inkhorn 
words  of  Latin  origin.  The  idiom,  too,  is  purely  English  :  he 
differs  but  seldom  from  modern  idiom,  and  then  from  using  Eng- 
lish idioms  that  have  become  obsolete,  not  from  any  affectation  of 
foreign  syntax. 

As  a  master  of  the  living  English  of  his  time,  he  must  rank 
among  the  highest.  Even  to  modern  readers  his  diction  is  rich 
and  varied  ;  the  fitting  word  is  chosen  with  an  apparent  ease  that 
implies  a  great  power  over  the  language. 

Sentences. — Nathan  Drake's  criticisms  of  Sidney's  style  as 
"nerveless  and  incompact,"  can  apply  only  to  the  sentences.  The 
component  clauses  are  framed  with  great  versatility,  sometimes 
with  a  rich  long-drawn  melody,  sometimes  with  pointed  neatness, 
sometimes  with  proverbial  conciseness.  In  putting  the  clauses 
together,  he  is  certainly  careless.  He  does  not,  like  Jeremy  Taylor, 
pour  them  out  breathlessly  without  any  syntax  whatever,  but  he 
rambles  on  without  much  regard  to  unity  or  to  the  symmetrical 
distribution  of  his  matter.  In  our  various  quotations,  the  reader 
will  see  his  ordinary  sentences  ;  the  following  is  a  specimen  of  his 
worst  form : — 


SIB  PHILIP  SIDNEY.  205 

"  The  country  Arcadia  among  all  the  provinces  of  Greece,  hath  ever  been 
had  in  singular  reputation  ;  partly  for  the  sweetness  of  the  air,  and  other 
natural  benefits,  but  principally  for  the  well-tempered  minds  of  the  people, 
who  (finding  that  the  shining  title  of  glory,  so  much  affected  by  other 
nations,  doth  indeed  help  little  to  the  happiness  of  life)  are  the  only  people, 
which,  as  by  their  justice  and  providence  give  neither  cause  nor  hope  to 
their  neighbours  to  annoy ;  so  are  they  not  stirred  with  false  praise  to  trouble 
others'  quiet,  thinking  it  a  small  reward  for  the  wasting  of  their  own  lives 
in  ravening,  that  their  posterity  should  long  after  say,  they  had  done  so." 

Paragraphs. — Our  author's  paragraph  arrangement  is  very  irre- 
gular, though  not  worse  than  the  average  of  his  time.  Sometimes, 
when  he  ought  to  begin  a  new  paragraph,  he  does  not  even  begin 
a  new  sentence.  The  following  passage  is  an  example  of  his  want 
of  strict  method  : — 

"  Poesy,  therefore,  is  an  art  of  imitation,  for  so  Aristotle  termeth  it  in  his 
word  Mimesis,  that  is  to  say,  a  representing,  counterfeiting,  or  figuring 
forth  :  to  speak  metaphorically,  a  speaking  picture :  with  this  end,  to  teach 
and  delight ;  of  this  have  been  three  several  kinds.  The  chief,  both  in 
antiquity  and  excellency,  were  they  that  did  imitate  the  inconceivable  excel- 
lencies of  God.  Such  were  David  in  his  Psalms  ;  Solomon  in  his  Song  of 
Songs,  in  his  Ecclesiastes,  and  Proverbs  ;  Moses  and  Deborah  in  their 
hymns,  and  the  writer  of  Job ;  which,  beside  other,  the  learned  Emanuel 
Tremilius  and  Franciscus  Junius  do  entitle  the  poetical  part  of  the  Scripture. 
Against  these  none  will  speak  that  hath  the  Holy  Ghost  in  due  holy 
reverence. 

"  In  this  kind,  though  in  a  wrong  divinity,  were  Orpheus,  Amphion, 
Homer  in  his  hymns,  and  many  other,  both  Greeks  and  Romans  ;  and  this 
Poesy  must  be  used,  by  whosoever  will  follow  S.  James  his  counsel,  in  sing- 
ing Psalms  when  they  are  merry  ;  and  I  know  is  used  with  the  fruit  of  com- 
fort by  some,  when  in  sorrowful  pangs  of  their  death-bringing  sins,  they 
find  the  consolation  of  the  never-leaving  goodness. 

"The  second  kind  is  of  them  that  deal  with  matters  philosophical ;  either 
moral,  as,  &c. :  .  .  .  which  who  mislike,  the  fault  is  in  their  judg- 
ments quite  out  of  taste,  and  not  in  the  sweet  food  of  sweetly  uttered  know- 
ledge. But  because  this  second  sort  is  wrapped  within  the  fold  of  the  pro- 
posed subject,  and  takes  not  the  course  of  his  own  invention,  whether  they 
be  properly  Poets  or  no,  let  Grammarians  dispute :  and  go  to  the  third, 
indeed  right  Poets,  of  whom,"  &c. 

Minor  niceties,  of  course,  we  need  not  look  for.  It  is,  however, 
interesting  to  meet  the  following  example  of  a  set  comparison, 
where  the  order  of  the  balance  is  better  kept  than  in  some  of  the 
celebrated  later  efforts  after  the  same  plan.  He  is  describing 
"  the  two  daughters  of  King  Basilius,  so  beyond  measure  excellent 
in  all  the  gifts  allotted  to  reasonable  creatures,  that  we  may  think 
they  were  born  to  show  that  nature  is  no  step-mother  to  that  sex, 
how  much  soever  some  men  (sharp-witted  only  in  evil-speaking) 
have  sought  to  disgrace  them  : " — 

"The  elder  is  named  Pamela;  by  many  men  not  deemed  inferior  to  her 
sister  :  for  my  part,  when  I  marked  them  both,  methought  there  was  ^if  at 


206  FROM    1580  TO   1610. 

least  such  perfections  may  receive  the  name  of  more)  more  sweetness  in 
Philoclea,  but  more  majesty  in  Pamela.  Methought  love  played  in  Philoclea's 
eyes,  and  threatened  in  Pamela's :  methought  Philoclea's  beauty  only  per- 
suaded, but  so  persuaded  as  all  hearts  must  yield.  Pamela's  beauty  used 
violence,  and  such  violence  as  no  heart  could  resist.  And  it  seems  that 
such  proportion  is  between  their  minds  ;  PhUodea  so  bashful,  as  if  her 
excellencies  had  stolen  into  her  before  she  was  aware  ;  so  humble  that  she 
will  put  all  pride  out  of  countenance  ;  in  sum,  such  proceeding  as  will  stir 
hope,  but  teach  hope  good  manners.  Pamela  of  high  thoughts,  who  avoids 
not  pride  with  not  knowing  her  excellencies,  but  by  making  that  one  of  her 
excellencies  to  be  void  of  pride  ;  her  mother's  wisdom,  greatness,  nobility, 
but  (if  I  guess  aright)  knit  with  a  more  constant  temper." 

Figures. — Sidney  is  wholly  free  from  what  he  condemns  in  Lyly 
— excess  of  similes  and  parallels.  He  makes  comparatively  few 
formal  similitudes.  Some  of  those  that  he  does  make  are  singularly 
apt.  The  saying  that  Chevy  Chase  "  moved  him  like  the  sound 
of  a  trumpet,"  is  as  familiar  as  any  of  Shakspeare's.  Another 
similitude  borrowed  or  stolen  from  him  is  scarcely  less  famous.  A 
combat  between  two  of  his  heroes  he  describes  as  being  like  a 
battle  between  a  Spanish  galleon  and  an  English  man-of-war.  The 
figure  is  well  known  as  applied  by  Fuller  to  Ben  Jonson  and 
Shakspeare. 

'While  comparatively  free  from  gaudy  and  fantastic  embellish- 
ments, one  of  the  worst  vices  of  the  Elizabethan  style,  he  is  not  a 
plain  writer.  He  shows  that  he  was  bred  in  the  same  school  of 
prose  as  the  Euphuist  Lyly.  His  peculiar  affectation  consists  in 
an  excessive  use  of  fanciful  personifications  and  fanciful  antitheses ; 
fancies  usually  sweet  and  graceful,  and  palling  only  from  overmuch 
repetition.  We  touched  on  this  in  the  brief  account  of  his  char- 
acter ;  we  shall  find  abundant  examples  in  the  quotations  that 
follow.  When  the  subject-matter  is  beautiful  and  pleasing,  these 
graceful  fancies  are  an  additional  charm ;  when  the  subject  ia 
grave  or  lofty,  they  are  inharmonious  and  out  of  place. 

Perhaps  the  most  pleasing  use  of  his  personifications  is  in  the 
description  of  nature.  He  often  expresses  the  time  of  the  day 
euphemistically.  For  example  :  "  About  the  time  that  the  candles 
began  to  inherit  the  sun's  office ; "  "  seeing  the  day  begin  to  dis- 
close her  comfortable  beauties ; "  "  as  soon  as  the  morning  had 
took  a  full  possession  of  the  element ; "  and  suchlike.  In  describ- 
ing landscape  he  follows  no  descriptive  method ;  merely  over- 
laying the  various  particulars  of  a  scene  with  his  "  flowers  of 
poetry,"  "sugared"  epithets  and  pleasing  figurative  conceits. 
Thus  he  describes  how  Musidorus  and  Clitophon  came  to  "  a 
pleasant  valley,  on  either  side  of  which  high  hills  lifted  up  their 
beetle  brows,  as  if  they  would  overlook  t/te  pleasantness  of  the  under 
prospect."  And  how  "  they  laid  them  down  hard  by  the  murmur- 
ing music  of  certain  waters,  which  spouted  out  of  the  side  of  the 


SIR   PHILIP   SIDNEY.  207 

hills,  and  In  the  bottom  of  the  valley  made  of  many  springs  a 
pretty  brook,  like  a  commonwealth  of  many  families." 

The  following  longer  passage  is  really  an  example  of  his 
favourite  figures,  rather  than  an  illustration  of  any  descriptive 
art : — 

"  It  was  indeed  a  place  of  delight ;  for  through  the  midst  of  it  there  ran 
a  sweet  brook,  which  did  both  hold  the  eye  open  with  her  azure  streams, 
and  yet  seek  to  close  the  eye  with  the  purling  noise  it  made  upon  the  pebble 
stones  it  ran  over  :  the  field  itself  being  set  in  some  places  with  roses,  and 
in  all  the  rest  constantly  preserving  a  flourishing  green  :  the  roses  added 
such  a  ruddy  show  unto  it,  as  though  the  field  were  bashful  at  its  own 
beauty :  about  it,  as  if  it  had  been  to  enclose  a  theatre,  grew  such  sort  of 
trees,  as  either  excellency  of  fruit,  stateliness  of  growth,  continual  green- 
ness, or  poetical  fancies,  have  made  at  any  time  famous.  In  most  part  of 
which  there  had  been  framed  by  art  such  pleasant  arbours,  that,  one  answer- 
ing another,  they  became  a  gallery  aloft  from  tree  to  tree  almost  round 
about,  which  below  gave  a  perfect  shadow  ;  a  pleasant  refuge  then  from  the 
choleric  look  of  Phoebus." 

QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity  and  Clearness. — Sidney's  style,  as  we  have  said,  is  free 
alike  from  the  "  inkhorn  "  technical  words  of  the  learned  pedant, 
and  from  the  French  and  "  Italianate  "  words  of  the  travelled  man 
of  fashion.  His  meaning  is  also  less  cumbered  and  interrupted 
with  superfluous  quotations  than  was  common  at  the  time. 

The  order  of  topics  in  the  Apology  shows  little  sense  of  the 
value  of  good  arrangement.  There  is  a  kind  of  rough  method  on 
the  large  scale.  He  first  sets  out  the  true  nature  and  value  of 
poetry,  then  answers  objections,  and  concludes  with  a  criticism  of 
existing  poetry.  But  within  these  divisions  he  jumps  from  one 
thing  to  another  without  restraint. 

Precision  in  the  use  of  words  was  little  attended  to  till  much 
later  in  the  history  of  our  language. 

Strength. — The  'Arcadia'  being  a 'chivalrous  romance,  is  an 
excellent  field  for  a  powerful  style.  In  the  imagination  of  thrill- 
ing adventures,  reckless  braving  of  danger,  exploits  of  super- 
human heroism,  our  author  shows  a  keen  enjoyment  of  vigorous 
action.  Musidorus  and  Pyrocles  perform  the  most  wonderful 
achievements — leading  armies,  quelling  tumults,  fighting  single 
combats,  passing  from  chains  and  imprisonment  to  victorious  com- 
mand,— achievements  well  fitted  to  exercise  the  highest  powers  of 
vigorous  narrative  and  description. 

We  have  seen  (p.  202)  how  this  stirring  and  imposing  activity 
is  qualified  and  softened  down.  Partly  there  is  a  large  admixture 
of  gentler  elements  in  the  plot,  the  exploits .  being  for  the  most 
part  either  done  at  the  instigation  of  love,  or  recited  to  gratify  the 
curiosity  of  fair  hearers.  But  what  we  are  concerned  with  here  ia 


208  FROM   1580  TO   KilO- 

not  so  much  the  subject-matter  as  the  manner  of  presentation.  As 
already  noted  incidentally,  Sidney's  style  is  deliberately  the  reverse 
of  exciting  or  elevating.  Whether  he  is  reciting  grim  deeds  of 
battle,  or  describing  the  most  terrific  phenomena  of  nature,  he 
tempers  the  account  with  soft  and  humorous  fancies.  He  wrote 
the  'Arcadia'  more  to  amuse  himself  and  his  sister  than  to  set 
forth  thrilling  and  heroic  incidents  in  their  appropriate  language. 
The  following  are  two  examples  of  his  treatment  of  exciting 
themes.  The  manner  as  a  whole  would  not  be  tolerated  in  the 
present  age,  and  even  as  a  relic  of  antiquity  will  hardly  be  en- 
joyed if  read  as  a  serious  effort  We  must  keep  in  mind  that  the 
youthful  knight  wrote  for  the  entertainment  of  his  sister  and  her 
lady  friends  ;  and  that,  with  all  his  softness  and  courtesy,  he  took 
pleasure  in  occasionally  shocking  his  gentle  readers  with  somewhat 
grim  humour : — 

"  But  by  this  time  there  had  been  a  furious  meeting  of  either  side  :  where 
after  the  terrible  salutation  of  warlike  noise,  the  shaking  of  hands  was  with 
sharp  weapons ;  some  lances,  according  to  the  metal  they  met  and  skill  of 
the  guider,  did  stain  themselves  in  blood  ;  some  flew  up  in  pieces,  as  if  they 
would  threaten  heaven  because  they  failed  on  earth.  But  their  office  was 
quickly  inherited,  either  by  (the  prince  of  weapons)  the  sword,  or  by  some 
heavy  mace,  or  biting  axe  ;  which  hunting  still  the  weakest  chace,  sought 
ever  to  light  there  where  smallest  resistance  might  worse  prevent  mischief. 
The  clashing  of  armour,  and  crushing  of  staves,  the  jostling  of  bodies,  the 
resounding  of  blows,  was  the  first  part  of  that  ill-agreeing  musick,  which  was 
beautified  with  the  grisliness  of  wounds,  the  rising  of  dust,  the  hideous  falls 
and  the  groans  of  the  dying.  The  very  horses  angry  in  their  master's  anger, 
with  love  and  obedience,  brought  forth  the  effects  of  hate  and  resistance,  and 
with  minds  of  servitude  did  as  if  they  affected  glory.  Some  lay  dead  under 
their  dead  masters,  whom  unknightly  wounds  had  unjustly  punished  for  a 
faithful  duty.  Some  lay  upon  their  lords  by  like  accident,  and  in  death  had 
the  honour  to  be  borne  by  them,  whom  in  life  they  had  borne.  Some  hav- 
ing lost  their  commanding  burthens,  ran  scattered  about  the  field,  abashed 
with  the  madness  of  mankind.  .The  earth  itself  (wont  to  be  a  burial  of  men) 
was  now,  as  it  were,  buried  with  men  :  so  was  the  face  thereof  hidden  with 
dead  bodies,  to  whom  death  had  come  masked  in  divers  manners.  In  ona 
place  lay  disinherited  heads  dispossessed  of  their  natural  seignories  ;  in 
another,  whole  bodies  to  see  to,  but  that  their  hearts  wont  to  be  bound  all 
over  so  close,  were  now,  with  deadly  violence,  opened  :  in  others,  fouler 
deaths  had  uglily  displayed  their  trailing  guts.  There  lay  arms,  whose 
fingers  yet  moved,  as  if  they  would  feel  for  him  that  made  them  feel ;  and 
legs  which,  contrary  to  common  reason,  by  being  discharged  of  their  burthen, 
were  grown  heavier.  But  no  sword  payed  so  large  a  tribute  of  souls  to  the 
eternal  kingdom  as  that  of  Amphialus  ;  who,  like  a  tiger  from  whom  a  com- 
pany of  wolves  did  seek  to  ravish  a  new-gotten  prey,  so  he  (remembering 
they  came  to  take  away  Philodea)  did  labour  to  make  valour,  strength, 
choler,  and  hatred  to  answer  the  proportion  of  his  love,  which  was  infinite." 

"But  by  that  the  next  morning  began  a  little  to  make  a  gilded  show  of  a 
good  meaning,  there  nrose  even  with  the  sun,  avail  of  dark  clouds  before  his 
face,  which  shortly,  like  ink  poured  into  water,  had  blacked  over  all  thefaco 


SIR  PHILIP   SIDNEY.  209 

of  heaven  ;  preparing  as  it  were  a  mournful  stage  for  a  tragedy  to  be  played 
on.  For  forthwith  the  winds  began  to  speak  louder,  and  as  in  a  tumultuous 
kingdom,  to  think  themselves  fittest  instruments  of  commandment ;  and 
blowing  whole  storms  of  hail  and  rain  upon  them,  they  were  sooner  in 
danger  than  they  could  almost  bethink  themselves  of  change.  For  then  the 
traitorous  sea  began  to  swell  in  pride  against  the  afflicted  navy,  under  which, 
while  the  heaven  favoured  them,  it  had  lain  so  calmly,  making  mountains 
of  itself,  over  which  the  tossed  and  tottering  ship  should  climb,  to  be 
straight  carried  down  again  to  a  pit  of  hellish  darkness  ;  with  such  cruel 
blows  against  the  sides  of  the  ship  that,  which  way  soever  it  went,  was  still 
in  his  malice  that  there  was  left  neither  power  to  stay,  nor  way  to  escnpe. 
.  .  .  But  in  the  ship  wherein  the  princes  were,  now  left  as  much  alone 
as  proud  lords  be  when  fortune  fails  them,  though  they  employed  all  in- 
dustry to  save  themselves,  yet  what  they  did  was  rather  for  duty  to  nature 
than  hope  to  escape  so  ugly  a  darkness  as  if  it  would  prevent  the  night's 
coming,  usurped  the  day's  right :  which  accompanied  sometimes  with 
thunders,  always  with  horrible  noises  of  the  chasing  winds,  made  the 
masters  and  pilots  so  astonished  that  they  knew  not  how  to  direct ;  and  if 
they  knew  they  could  scarcely,  when  they  directed,  hear  their  own  whistle. 
For  the  sea  strove  with  the  winds  which  should  be  louder,  and  the  shrouds 
of  the  ship,  with  a  ghastful  noise  to  them  that  were  in  it,  witnessed,  that 
their  ruin  was  the  wager  of  the  other's  contention,  and  the  heaven  roaring 
out  thunder  the  more  amazed  them  as  having  those  powers  for  enemies. 
There  was  to  be  seen  the  divers  manner  of  minds  in  distress  ;  some  sat  upon 
the  top  of  the  poop  weeping  and  wailing,  till  the  sea  swallowed  them  ;  some 
one  more  able  to  abide  death  than  the  fear  of  death,  cut  his  own  throat  to 
prevent  drowning ;  some  prayed ;  and  there  wanted  not  of  them  which 
cursed,  as  if  the  heavens  could  not  be  more  angry  than  they  were." 

Pathos. — In  the  '  Arcadia '  there  are  very  few  passages  to  gratify 
the  taste  for  the  pathos  of  tender  regret  Pitiable  incidents  occur 
very  often,  but  they  serve  to  keep  alive  the  stir  of  the  plot,  and  do 
not  invite  us  to  shut  the  book  and  indulge  in  melancholy  tender- 
ness. The  misery  of  the  sufferers  is  too  intense  to  be  pathetic. 
They  suffer  from  the  pangs  of  despised  love,  from  the  agony  of 
bereavement,  from  the  rage  of  remorse ;  they  are  not  resigned  to 
their  fata 

The  following  are  two  exceptions  to  the  above  general  statement 
— two  pitiful  incidents  that  have  no  influence  on  the  plot,  and  are 
good  subjects  for  pathetic  treatment.  One  is  the  death  of  young 
Agenor,  related  with  genuine  pathos.  Had  the  death  of  the  gay 
youth  been  wilful,  it  would  have  moved  us  with  horror ;  being  an 
accident,  it  touches  us  with  sorrow  as  for  an  unavoidable  and 
irremediable  misfortune : — 

"  His  name  was  Agenor,  of  all  that  army  the  most  beautiful ;  who  having 
ridden  in  sportful  conversation  among  the  foremost,  all  armed,  saving  that 
his  beaver  was  up,  to  have  his  breath  at  more  freedom,  seeing  Amphialus 
come  a  pretty  way  before  his  company,  neither  stayipg  the  commandment 
of  his  captain,  nor  reckoning  whether  his  face  were  armed  or  no,  set  spurs 
to  his  horse,  and  with  youthful  bravery  casting  his  staff  about  his  head,  put 
it  then  in  his  rest,  as  careful  of  comely  carrying  it  as  if  the  mark  had  been 
but  a  ring  and  the  lookers-on  ladies.  But  Amphiahis's  lance  was  already 

o 


210  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

come  to  the  last  of  his  descending  line,  and  began  to  make  ths  full  point  of 
death  against  the  head  of  this  young  gentleman  ;  when  Amphialus,  per- 
ceiving his  youth  and  beauty,  compassion  so  rebated  the  edge  of  choler  that 
he  spared  that  fair  nakedness,  and  let  his  staff  fall  to  Agenor's  vampalt :  so 
as  both  with  brave  breaking  should  hurtlessly  have  performed  that  match, 
but  that  the  pitiless  lance  of  Amphialus  (angry  with  being  broken)  with  an 
unlucky  counterbuff,  full  of  unsparing  splinters,  lighted  upon  that  face,  far 
fitter  for  the  combats  of  Venus  ;  giving  not  only  a  sudden  but  a  foul  death, 
leaving  scarcely  any  tokens  of  his  former  beauty  ;  but  his  hands  abandoning 
the  reins  and  his  thighs  the  saddle,  he  fell  sideward  from  the  horse. " 

The  other  is  the  death  of  Parthenia — a  lady  who,  when  her 
husband  was  slain,  put  on  armour,  challenged  his  victor,  and 
perished  in  the  fight.  Sidney  overlays  this  painful  subject  with 
his  favourite  figures.  It  is  difficult  to  feel  in  what  mood  such  an 
incident  could  appear  a  suitable  ground  for  such  embroidery : — 

"  But  the  head-piece  was  no  sooner  off,  but  that  there  fell  about  the 
shoulders  of  the  overcome  knight  the  treasure  of  fair  golden  hair,  which 
with  the  face  (soon  known  by  the  badge  of  excellency)  witnessed  that  it  was 
Parthenia,  the  unfortunately  virtuous  wife  of  Argalus ;  her  beauty  then, 
even  in  despite  of  the  passed  sorrow,  or  coming  death,  assuring  all  beholders 
that  it  was  nothing  short  of  perfection.  For  her  exceeding  fair  eyes,  hav- 
ing with  continual  weeping  gotten  a  little  redness  about  them,  her  round 
sweetly-swelling  lips  a  little  trembling,  as  though  they  kissed  their  neigh- 
bour death  ;  in  her  cheeks  the  whiteness  striving  by  little  and  little  to  get 
upon  the  rosiness  of  them;  her  neck,  a  neck  indeed  of  alabaster,  displaying 
the  wound,  which  with  most  dainty  blood  laboured  to  drown  his  own  beau- 
ties ;  so  as  here  was  a  river  of  purest  red,  there  an  island  of  perfectest  white, 
each  giving  lustre  to  the  other,  with  the  sweet  countenance,  God  knows, 
full  of  an  unaffected  languishing  :  though  these  things  to  a  grossly  conceiv- 
ing sense  might  seem  disgraces,  yet  indeed  were  they  but  apparelling  beauty 
in  a  new  fashion,  which  all  looked  upon  through  the  spectacles  of  pity,  did 
even  increase  the  lines  of  her  natural  fairness  ;  so  as  Ampkialus  was  aston- 
ished with  grief,  compassion,  and  shame,  detesting  his  fortune  that  made 
him  unfortunate  in  victory." 

Sidney's  true  pathos  lies  chiefly  in  pictures  of  beauty  and 
devotedness.  With  such  subjects  his  fancies  are  more  in  keep- 
ing.  We  have  seen  (p.  206)  with  what  sweetness  he  can  describe 
natural  scenery.  In  his  descriptions  of  female  beauty,  he  is  some- 
times a  little  more  sensuous  than  the  taste  of  our  period  thinks 
becoming.  But  there  is  much  of  his  description  that  none  need 
hesitate  to  read.  The  following  hyperbolical  passage  contains 
what  is  possibly  the  original  of  one  of  Shakspeare's  sweetest 
fancies : — 

"  Her  breath  is  more  sweet  than  a  gentle  south-west  wind,  which  comes 
creeping  over  flowery  fields  and  shadowed  waters  in  the  extreme  heat  of 
summer  ;  and  yet  is  nothing  compared  to  the  honey-flowing  speech  that 
breath  doth  carry  ;  no  more  all  that  our  eyes  can  see  of  her  (though  when 
they  have  seen  her,  what  else  they  shall  ever  see  is  but  dry  stubble  after 
clover-grass)  is  to  be  matched  with  the  flock  of  unspeakable  virtues,  laid  up 
delightfully  in  that  best-builded  fold." 


SIR   PHILIP   SIDNEY.  211 

His  personifications   appear   to   advantage  in   such   passages  as 
this : — 

"  And  as  the  ladies  played  there  in  the  water,  sometimes  striking  it  with 
their  hands,  the  water  (making  lines  cm  his  face)  .sremed  to  smile  at  such 
beating,  and,  with  twenty  bubbles,  not  to  be  content  to  have  the  picture  of 
their  face  in  large  upon  him,  but  he  would  in  each  of  those  bubbles  set  forth 
the  miniature  of  them. " 

The  '  Arcadia '  is  brimful  of  chivalrous  devotion.  Every  per- 
sonage is  one  of  a  pair  of  lovers — Pyrocles  and  Philoclea,  Musi- 
dorus  and  Pamela,  Helen  and  Amphialus,  Amphialus  and  Pamela, 
Argalus  and  Parthenia,  Phalantus  and  Artesia,  tkc.  The  friend- 
ship of  Pyrocles  and  Musidorus  is  like  the  friendship  of  Pylades 
and  Orestes.  When  the  one  is  supposed  to  be  drowned,  the  other 
is  restrained  only  by  force  from  casting  himself  into  the  sea. 
When  the  one  is  seized  and  threatened  with  death,  the  other  insists 
upon  taking  his  place.  It  would  indeed  be  difficult  to  make  any 
alteration  in  the  plot  that  should  bring  out  more  numerous  or 
more  striking  acts  of  devotedness. 

Humour. — Sidney's  humour  is  hearty,  joyous — bordering  some- 
times upon  farce,  but  usually  refined  by  the  wit  of  the  expression. 
In  the  '  Arcadia  '  he  has  one  or  two  humorous  characters,  notably 
Dametas  and  Mopsa;1  and  describes  some  exquisitely  ludicrous 
scenes,  such  as  the  fight  between  the  two  cowards  Dametas  and 
Clinias,  and  Mopsa  in  the  wishing-tree.  The  following  passage, 
occurring  in  the  description  of  a  riot,  is  very  farcical,  without 
much  wit  to  give  it  refinement : — 

"  Yet  among  the  rebels  there  was  a  dapper  fellow,  a  tailor  by  occupation, 
who  fetching  his  courage  only  from  their  going  back,  began  to  bow  his  knees, 
and  very  fencer-like  to  draw  near  to  Zelmane.  But  as  he  came  within  her 
distance,  turning  his  sword  very  nicely  about  his  crown,  Basilius  struck  off 
his  nose.  He  (being  suitor  to  a  seamstress's  daughter,  and  therefore  not 
a  little  grieved  for  such  a  disgrace)  he  stooped  down,  because  he  had  heard 
that  if  it  were  fresh  put  to,  it  would  cleave  on  again.  But  as  his  hand  waa 
on  the  ground  to  bring  his  nose  to  his  head,  Zelmane  with  a  blow  sent  his 
head  to  his  nose." 

There  is  a  boyish  freshness  and  simplicity  about  the  humour 
of  the  Apology.  In  the  beginning,  by  way  of  anticipating  the 
criticism  that  he  is  a  prejudiced  enthusiast  in  favour  of  poetry  he 
tells  a  humorous  story  to  bring  out  that  "  self-love  is  better  than 
any  gilding  to  make  that  seem  gorgeous  wherein  ourselves  are 
parties."  He  tells  us  how  he  and  a  friend  took  lessons  of  a  riding- 
master  in  Vienna,  and  that  this  gentleman,  "  according  to  the 
fertileness  of  the  Italian  wit,  did  not  only  afford  us  the  demonstra- 
tion of  his  practice,  but  sought  to  enrich  our  minds  with  the  con- 
templations therein,  which  he  thought  most  precious."  He  then 

*  Mopsa  is  borrowed  by  Shakspeare. 


212  FROM   1580  TO    1610. 

recounts  some  of  Pugliano's  bravuras  about  the  value  of  horseman- 
ship— "  skill  of  government  was  but  a  pedanteria  in  comparison  " 
— and  repeats  some  of  his  eloquent  praises  of  the  horse  : — 

"  The  only  serviceable  courtier  without  flattery,  the  beast  of  most  beauty, 
faithfulness,  courage,  and  such  more,  that  if  1  had  not  been  a  piece  of  a 
logician  before  I  came  to  him,  /  think  he  would  have  persuaded  me  to  have 
wished  myself  a  horse." 

His  argument  for  the  unities  is  enlivened  by  a  similar  spirit  of 
boisterous  mockery: — 

"For  where  the  stage  should  always  represent  but  one  place,  and  the 
uttermost  time  presupposed  in  it  should  be,  both  by  Aristotle's  precept  and 
common  reason,  but  one  day :  there  is  both  many  days  and  many  places, 
inartilicially  imagined.  But  if  it  be  so  in  Gorboduc,  how  much  more  in  all 
the  rest  ?  Where  you  shall  have  Asia  of  the  one  side,  and  Afric  of  the  other, 
and  so  many  other  under-kingdoms  that  the  Player,  when  he  cometh  in, 
must  ever  begin  with  telling  where  he  is  :  or  else  the  tale  will  not  be  con- 
ceived. Now  ye  shall  have  three  ladies  walk  to  gather  flowers,  and  then  we 
must  believe  the  stage  to  be  a  Garden.  By-and-by  we  hear  news  of  shipwreck 
in  the  same  place,  and  then  we  are  to  blame  if  we  accept  it  not  for  a  Rock. 

"  Upon  the  back  of  that,  conies  out  a  hideous  monster  with  fire  and 
smoke,  and  then  the  miserable  beholders  are  bound  to  take  it  lor  a  Cave. 
While  in  the  meantime,  two  armies  Hy  in,  represented  with  four  swords  and 
bucklers,  and  then  what  hard  heart  will  not  receive  it  for  a  pitched  field  ? 
Now,  of  time  they  are  much  more  liberal,  for  ordinary  it  is  that  two  princes 
fall  in  love.  After  many  traverses  she  is  got  with  child,  delivered  of  a  fair 
boy,  he  is  lost,  groweth  a  man,  falls  in  love,  and  is  ready  to  get  another 
child,  and  all  this  in  two  hours  space  :  which  how  absurd  it  is  in  sense,"  &c. 

This  must  have  been  very  amusing  ridicule  x  of  the  stage  as  it 
existed  in  Sidney's  time,  though  from  the  change  of  circumstances 
it  has  not  the  same  effect  for  us.  The  mock-heroic  close  of  the 
Apology  has  not  yet  lost  its  force,  though  even  it  is  perhaps  too 
exuberant  for  modern  taste  : — 

"Thus  doing,  your  name  shall  flourish  in  the  Printer's  shops  ;  thus  doing, 
you  shall  be  of  kin  to  many  a  poetical  preface  ;  thus  doing,  you  shall  be  most 
fair,  most  rich,  most  wise,  most  all, — you  shall  dwell  upon  superlatives.  .  .  . 
But  if  (fie  of  such  a  But)  you  be  borne  so  near  the  dull-making  Cataphract 
of  Nilus  that  you  cannot  hear  the  Planet-like  Music  of  Poetiy,  if  you  have 
so  earth-creeping  a  mind,  that  it  cannot  lift  itself  up  to  look  to  the  sky  of 
Poetry  ;  or  rather,  by  a  certain  rustical  disdain  will  become  such  a  Mome, 
as  to  be  a  Momus  of  Poetry  :  then,  though  I  will  not  wish  unto  you  the 
Ass's  ears  of  Midas,  nor  to  be  driven  by  a  Poet's  verses  (as  Bubonax  was)  to 
hang  himself,  nor  to  be  rhymed  to  death,  as  is  said  to  be  done  in  Ireland  ; 
yet  thus  much  curse  I  must  send  you,  in  the  behalf  of  all  Poets,  that  while 
you  live,  you  live  in  love,  and  never  get  favour,  for  lacking  skill  of  a  Sonnet ; 
and  when  you  die,  your  memory  die  from  the  earth  for  want  of  an  Epitaph. " 

Melody.  Harmony. — We  have  already  remarked  (Sentences,  p. 
204)  that  Sidney  is  versatile  in  the  movement  of  his  language. 

*  It  may  have  suggested  the  incomparable  fun  of  the  play  before  Theseus  in 
'  Midsummer  Night's  Dream.' 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  213 

Every  reader  must  notice  how  readily  he  adapts  his  rhythm  to 
pointed  wit  or  flowing  declamation.  Few  of  our  writers  surpass 
him  in  soaring  and  bringing  out  a  full  melodious  cadence.  The 
last-quoted  sentence  is  as  measured  and  stately  in  its  movement  as 
could  well  be  found.  In  some  of  the  tender  passages,  the  music  of 
the  language  is  such  as  can  hardly  be  imitated  under  present  laws 
of  taste  as  regards  epithets.  The  following  is  an  instance — "  the 
nightingales  one  with  the  other  striving  which  could  in  most  dainty 
variety  recount  t/teir  wrong-caused  sorrow.1' 

It  is  needless  to  review  Sidney's  style  at  length  under  the  kinds 
of  composition.  We  have  seen  that  he  has  no  descriptive  method 
— that  the  only  merit  of  his  description  lies  in  the  graces  of  his 
style.  As  a  Narrator,  he  relates  events  with  clearness  ;  but  the 
different  lines  of  events  are  so  numerous  and  interwoven  that  it  is 
difficult  to  avoid  getting  confused  among  them.  To  those  that  do 
not  enjoy  the  beauties  of  his  language,  the  numerous  speeches  and 
meditations  must  appear  a  tedious  impediment  to  the  action.  As 
regards  Exposition,  all  has  been  said  under  the  intellectual  quali- 
ties. In  the  way  of  Persuasion,  his  Apology  would  tell  partly  by 
its  clear  and  ingenious  arguments,  partly  by  its  winning  playful- 
ness of  manner  and  impetuous  exuberance  of  spirits. 

RICHARD  HOOKER,  15C3-1600. 

The  following  estimate  of  Hooker  by  the  author  of  the  '  Intro- 
duction to  the  Literature  of  Europe,'  is  often  quoted  :  "  So  stately 
'  and  graceful  is  the  march  of  his  periods,  so  various  the  fall  of  his 
'  musical  cadences  upon  the  ear,  so  rich  in  images,  so  condensed  in 
'  sentences,  so  grave  and  noble  his  diction,  so  little  is  there  of  vul- 
'  garity  in  his  racy  idiom,  of  pedantry  in  his  learned  phrase,  that 
'  1  know  not  whether  any  later  writer  has  more  admirably  dis- 
'  played  the  capacities  of  our  language,  or  produced  passages  more 
'  worthy  of  comparison  with  the  splendid  monuments  of  antiquity." 
Though  this  eloquent  panegyric  is  an  extreme  exaggeration,  and 
could  never  have  been  written  by  any  person  keeping  his  eye  on 
the  facts,  the  '  Ecclesiastical  Polity '  does  undoubtedly,  as  is  often 
said,  "  mark  an  era  in  English  prose."  In  some  respects  superior, 
in  some  inferior  to  Sidney's,  Hooker's  style  is  the  first  specimen  of 
good  prose  applied  to  the  weightier  purposes  of  literature. 

According  to  Izaak  Walton,  in  one  of  his  well-known  "  Lives," 
Hooker  was  born  at  Heavitree,  in  or  near  Exeter.  His  parents 
were  poor,  but  of  respectable  family ;  his  uncle  John  was  Chamber- 
lain of  Exeter.  His  father  designed  to  apprentice  him  to  a  trade ; 
but  his  schoolmaster,  seeing  the  boy's  abilities,  was  solicitous  that 
he  should  get  learning,  and  spoke  to  the  chamberlain  uncle.  The 
uncle  spoke  to  Jewel,  Bishop  of  Salisbury,  who  examined  the  young 


214  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

prodigy,  found  him  all  that  the  good  schoolmaster  represented,  gave 
him  a  pension,  and  in  1567  got  him  admitted  as  a  Clerk  (sizar,  ser- 
vitor, or  bursar)  to  Corpus  Christi,  Oxford.  In  1571  his  patron 
died,  and  Hooker  was  greatly  dejected,  and  even  in  tears,  about  his 
future  subsistence.  From  this  he  was  relieved  by  the  President  of 
the  College,  who  promised  to  be  his  friend  ;  and  some  nine  months 
after,  through  the  recommendation  of  his  late  patron,  he  got  as  a 
pupil  Edwin,  son  of  Bishop  Sandys,  whose  influence  was  afterwards 
of  great  service  to  him.  For  some  ten  years  after  this,  he  remained 
at  Oxford,  being  admitted  Fellow  of  his  College  in  1577,  appointed 
to  read  Hebrew  lectures  in  1579,  and  in  the  same  year  tempo- 
rarily expelled  along  with  Reynolds  for  some  reason  now  unknown. 
During  this  time  he  was  an  industrious  reader,  "  enriching,"  says 
Walton,  "  his  quiet  and  capacious  soul  with  the  precious  learning 
of  the  philosophers,  casuists,  and  schoolmen ;  and  with  them  the 
foundation  and  reason  of  all  laws,  both  sacred  and  civil ;  and  in- 
deed with  such  other  learning  as  lay  most  remote  from  the  track 
of  common  studies."  In  1581,  going  to  preach  in  London,  he  was 
led  to  make  an  unhappy  marriage ;  and  about  the  same  time  set- 
tled with  his  wife  in  the  living  of  Drayton  Beauchamp,  in  Bucking- 
hamshire. In  1584-85,  at  the  recommendation  of  Sandys,  whose 
son  had  seen  and  pitied  the  unhappiness  of  his  old  tutor's  married 
life,  Hooker  was  taken  in  hand  by  Archbishop  Whitgift,  and  through 
his  influence  appointed  Master  of  the  Temple,  in  the  Episcopal  in- 
terest, and  against  a  Presbyterian  champion  of  the  name  of  Travers, 
Here  began  Hooker's  labours  in  defence  of  Episcopacy.  Travers, 
a  bold  preacher,  with  a  popular  manner,  was  Afternoon  Lecturer 
in  the  Temple,  and  maintained  in  the  pulpit  Presbyterian  views  of 
Church  government  Hooker  preaching  in  the  forenoon,  "  the  pul- 
pit," as  Fuller  said,  "spake  pure  Canterbury  in  the  morning,  and 
Geneva  in  the  afternoon."  Travers,  silenced  by  Whitgift  on  the 
ground  of  insufficient  ordination,  continued  the  war  in  print ;  Hooker 
replied — but,  unfit  for  the  worry  of  controversy,  begged  from  his 
patron  some  quiet  post  in  the  country,  and  in  1591  removed  to  the 
living  of  Boscombe,  near  Salisbury.  Here  in  peace  and  privacy  he 
meditated  his  '  Ecclesiastical  Polity,'  and  published  the  first  four 
Books  in  1594.  Translated  in  1595  to  the  better  living  of  Bishops- 
borne,  near  Canterbury,  he  sent  a  fifth  Book  to  the  press  in  1597. 
He  died  in  1600,  leaving  three  more  Books  of  the  Polity.  The 
genuineness  of  these  later  books  is  doubted  by  Walton.  On  his 
and  other  evidence  it  is  contended  that  the  Sixth  Book  was  muti- 
lated by  the  Presbyterian  friends  of  Hooker's  wife,  and  interpo- 
lated with  other  matter  taken  from  Hooker's  papers ;  also  that  the 
Seventh  and  the  Eighth  received  a  bias  from  Presbyterian  hands. 
The  evidence  of  fraud,  though  not  improbable,  is  scarcely  conclusive. 
The  good  faith  of  Hooker's  Episcopal  friends  is  shown  by  their  pub- 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  215 

lishiug  what  they  believed  to  be  mutilated  copies.    The  Sixth  and 
Eighth  Books  were  first  published  in  1651,  the  Seventh  in  1662. 

From  Walton  we  have  a  circumstantial  description  of  Hooker  as 
"  a  man  in  poor  clothes,  his  loins  usually  girt  in  a  coarse  gown  or 
canonical  coat ;  of  a  mean  stature,  and  stooping,  and  yet  more 
lowly  in  the  thought  of  his  soul ;  his  body  worn  out,  not  with  age, 
but  study  and  holy  mortifications ;  his  face  full  of  heat-pimples, 
begot  by  his  inactivity  and  sedentary  life."  This  account  of  his 
poor  physique  is  borne  out  by  other  authorities.  Dr  Spenser  says 
that  his  body  was  spent  with  study,  and  Fuller  that  his  voice  was 
low  and  his  stature  little.  To  complete  his  bodily  infirmities, 
"though  not  purblind,  he  was  short  or  weak  sighted." 

Impartial  critics  will  not  join  the  devoted  admirers  of  Hooker  in 
placing  him  among  the  greatest  intellects  of  the  nation.  All  his 
life  through  he  was  a  most  industrious  student,  and  his  acquisi- 
tions as  a  scholar  were  undeniably  profound.  But  his  original 
force,  whether  as  a  thinker  or  as  an  expositor,  was  not  great  As 
a  champion  of  Episcopacy,  he  added  little  or  nothing  to  the  argu- 
ments of  Jewel  and  Whitgift.  Even  his  high  flights  of  eloquence 
are  not  always  original ;  in  many  cases  the  ideas  and  the  images  are 
borrowed,  the  diction  only  being  his  own.  In  the  application  of 
his  scholarship  he  is  often  very  ingenious.  His  great  fault,  and  it 
is  fatal  to  the  high  pretensions  set  up  for  him,  is  a  want  of  coher- 
ence. He  seems  incapable  of  the  effort  of  closely  concatenating 
his  thoughts.  As  he  writes,  a  quotation  occurs  to  him  having 
some  dim  application  to  his  present  subject ;  he  puts  down  the 
quotation,  but  leaves  its  bearing  vague  and  indistinct.  Something 
like  this  is  admitted,  as  it  must  be  admitted,  by  his  warmest  eulo- 
gists. The  explanation  probably  lies  in  his  constitutional  languor. 
What  his  intellect  might  have  done  in  a  more  vigorous  constitution 
of  body,  can  be  only  a  matter  of  speculation. — One  thing  may  be 
noted  by  way  of  parenthesis.  If  in  controversy  his  constitutional 
feebleness  interfered  with  the  clear  and  telling  application  of  his 
scholarship,  in  another  respect  it  gave  him  a  great  advantage  over 
his  opponents.  It  left  him  free  from  the  impulses  of  vehement 
attachment ;  no  impetuosity  of  conviction  hurried  him  into  un- 
reason ;  he  could  always  approach  his  subject  with  judicial  calm- 
ness, and  take  a,  circumspect  survey  of  his  ground.  This  dispas- 
sionate habit  strikes  us  in  every  sentence ;  it  is  Hooker's  chief 
distinction  amidst  the  fiery  partisanship  of  the  time.  Whether  his 
judgment  was  sound  or  unsound,  he  was  eminently  free  from  vehe- 
ment prejudice,  "or  mist  of  passionate  affection." 

Perhaps  the  chief  cause  of  the  over-estimation  of  Hooker's  intel- 
lectual force  is  the  extraordinary  musical  richness  of  his  language. 
Most  of  us  are  more  influenced  by  mere  pomp  of  sound  than  we 


216  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

might  be  willing  to  allow ;  and  the  melody  of  Hooker's  periods  is 
of  the  richest  order.  Like  De  Quincey,  he  was  extremely  suscep- 
tible t<>  the  "  luxuries  of  tlie  ear."  This  we  can  see  from  his  own 
account  of  how  music  affected  him  :  "  We  are  at  the  hearing  of 
some  more  inclined  unto  sorrow  and  heaviness,  of  some  more  molli- 
fied and  softened  in  mind ;  one  kind  apter  to  stay  and  settle  us, 
another  to  move  and  stir  our  affections  ;  there  is  that  draweth  to  a 
marvellous  grave  and  sober  mediocrity  ;  there  is  also  that  carrieth, 
as  it  were,  into  ecstasies^  filling  the  mind  with  a  heavenly  joy,  and 
for  the  time  in  a  manner  severing  it  from  the  body." 

Though  the  Polity  is  professedly  an  argumentative  work,  and 
does  contain  some  very  solid  dispassionate  argument,  his  mind  was 
perhaps  more  poetical  than  scientific.  Special  emotions  do  not 
assert  themselves  in  marked  individual  luxuriance.  The  poverty 
of  his  nature  in  vital  power  was  not  favourable  to  the  growth  of 
emotion.  We  meet  in  the  Polity  neither  rancorous  invective  nor 
passionate  sentimental  philanthropy,  neither  hero-worship  nor  exu- 
berant self-confident  vivacity.  The  work  is  as  utterly  deficient  in 
these  more  obtrusive  forms  of  emotion  as  could  well  be  conceived. 
The  basis  of  the  peculiar  poetic  vein  of  the  work  is  his  intense  fear 
of  every  mode  of  confusion,  strife,  agitation;  his  passionate  longing 
for  quiet  and  tranquillity.  He  dilates  with  an  approach  to  rapture 
on  "  the  glorious  inhabitants  of  those  sacred  palaces,  where  nothing 
but  light  and  blessed  immortality,  no  shadow  of  matter  for  tears, 
discontentments,  griefs,  and  uncomfortable  passions  to  work  upon, 
but  all  joy,  tranquillity,  and  peace,  even  for  ever  and  ever  doth 
dwell"  In  the  spirit  of  this  craving  for  peace,  and  weary  impa- 
tience of  conflict  and  excitement,  he  dwells  upon  the  prevalence 
of  order  throughout  nature,  upon  the  blessings  of  regularity  and 
authority  wherever  they  exist ;  and  passionately  deprecates  every 
.appearance  of  insubordination.  He  is  earnest  with  all  dissenters 
from  the  established  faith,  worship,  or  government,  to  give  up 
"  private  discretion,"  "  private  fancies,"  which  can  lead  only  to 
anarchy,  disturbance,  tumult  He  would  have  them  mature  their 
views,  submit  these  to  constituted  authority,  and  abide  by  the 
decision.  Meantime  let  them  obey  in  silence. 

What  we  know  of  his  demeanour  and  active  habits  confirms  the 
view  of  his  character  that  one  naturally  forms  from  reading  his 
works.  "  God  and  nature,"  says  Izaak  Walton,  "  blest  him  with 
so  blessed  a  bashfulness,  that  as  in  his  younger  days  his  pupils 
might  easily  look  him  out  of  countenance ;  so  neither  then,  nor  in 
his  age,  did  he  ever  look  any  man  in  the  face  ;  and  was  of  so  mild 
and  humble  a  nature,  that  his  poor  parish  clerk  and  he  did  never 
talk  but  with  both  their  hats  on,  or  both  off,  at  the  same  time  " 
All  circumstances  show  Hooker  to  have  been  an  unusually  shy, 
sensitive,  feeble  little  man,  with  very  little  activity,  and  very  low 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  217 

constitutional  power.  He  entered  the  controversies  of  his  time 
unwittingly  •  and,  after  a  short  experience,  begged  for  "  peace  and 
privacy."  When  forced  to  vindicate  what  he  had  said  in  his  ser- 
mons, he  did  so,  not  with  the  heat  of  a  strongly  persuaded  man  of 
energy,  but  with  the  meekness  and  charity  of  a  retiring  nature. 
How  much  he  leant  upon  others  appears  in  the  narrative  of  his 
college  life — so  different  from  the  sturdy  self-reliance  of  Johnson. 
Still  more  does  this  come  out  in  Walton's  well-known  account  of 
his  visit  to  the  "  Shunemite's  House "  in  London,  when  he  went 
up  from  Oxford  to  preach.  Reaching  London  on  the  l>ack  of  a 
horse  that  would  not  or  could  not  run,  wet,  weary,  weather-beaten, 
numb  with  wind  and  rain,  he  bitterly  refused  to  be  persua  led  that 
he  could  preach  within  two  days;  but  the  Shunemite,  Mrs  Church- 
man, by  cosy  nursing,  "  enabled  him  to  perform  the  office  of  the 
day,"  and  having  given  him  such  a  taste  of  the  comfort  of  womanly 
ministration,  persuaded  him  that  he  needed  a  wife,  drew  from  the 
unresisting  man  in  his  gratitude  a  commission  to  procure  one, 
and  provided  him  with  her  own  daughter. — There  is  hardly  to 
be  found  in  history  a  more  extreme  instance  of  a  man  wanting 
in  self-will,  and  submitting  himself  passively  to  the  disposal  of 
others.1 

Opinions.  —  One  of  the  many  eulogistic  sayings  concerning 
Hooker  is  that,  "should  the  English  Constitution  in  Churcii 
and  State  be  unhappily  ruined,  .  .  .  the  book "  ('  Ecclesi- 
astical Polity')  "probably  contains  materials  sufficient  for  repair- 
ing and  rebuilding  the  shattered  fabric."  A  less  glowing  admirer 
represents  him  as  "  the  one  adequate  exponent  of  the  religious 
ideas  and  policy  of  the  age  and  reign  of  Elizabeth."  Even  this 
needs  an  explanation.  Hooker  was  not,  as  this  would  imply,  an 
impartial  chronicler  of  all  existing  views  of  Church  doctrine, 
ritual,  and  government  He  was  the  champion  of  a  religious 
party — of  the  adherents  to  Episcopacy.  He  expounded  their 
views,  and  with  such  acceptance,  that  for  more  than  250  years 
he  has  been  honoured  as  a  main  bulwark  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land. Certainly  he  has  a  good  claim  to  his  title — "  the  judicious 
Hooker  ! "  The  profound  scholarship  of  the  work,  its  "  earnest 

1  The  story  is  doubted  by  Mr  Keble,  who  also,  by  way  of  exalting  Hooker'8 
virtue,  maintains  that  his  meekness  and  patience  under  his  wife  was  not  consti- 
tutional, but  a  painfully  acquired  self-command.  Had  old  Izaak  Walton's  ideal 
of  virtue  been  the  same  as  Mr  Keble's,  we  should  probably  never  have  heard  of 
Hooker's  passive  obedience  in  domestic  life  ;  hut  if  we  doubt  this  fact,  we  must 
doubt  manj-  others  that  confirm  it.  In  Walton's  Biography — and  it  is  our  only 
external  authority — Hooker  appears  as  an  inactive  mau  of  feelile  constitution, 
yielding  willingly  to  the  guidance  of  others.  That  he  should  show  signs  of  an 
irrital'le  temper  in  his  writings  is  hardly  to  the  purpose;  if  it  could  be  established. 
Self-assertion  upon  paper  and  self-assertion  hi  an  actual  preseuce  are  two  very 
different  things. 


218  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

longing  desire  to  see  things  brought  to  a  peaceable  end,"  its 
entire  freedom  from  partisan  heat,  and  consequent  appearance 
of  impartiality,  go  a  long  way  to  account  for  his  extraordinary 
popularity  as  a  doctrinal  writer. 

Another  cause  may  have  helped  in  some  small  degree.  We  have 
already  mentioned  his  occasional  vagueness,  his  hazy  application 
of  general  principles  and  parallel  citations.  This  dimness  of  ex- 
pression has  had  curious  results.  Men  of  diametrically  opposite 
opinions  have  sought  to  strengthen  their  cause  with  his  authority. 
James  II.  was  wont  to  say  that  Hooker's  Polity  converted  him  to 
Romanism.  Bishop  Hoadley,  a  Church  polemic  of  Queen  Anne's 
reign,  cited  Hooker  in  confirmation  of  his  views,  tnat  the  form  of 
Church  government  is  a  matter  of  Christian  expediency.  In  ex- 
treme opposition  to  this,  the  High  Church  party  re-edited  Hooker 
as  a  main  instrument  in  keeping  the  Anglican  Church  "  near  to 
primitive  truth  and  apostolical  order,"  as  upholding  the  divine 
right  of  Episcopacy,  and  the  doctrine  of  apostolical  succession. 
Had  Hooker  expressed  himself  with  greater  distinctness,  his  repu- 
tation might  have  been  less  universal. 


ELEMENTS   OF   STYLK. 

Vocabulary. — Hooker's  diction  is  not  so  modern  as  Sidney's. 
A  glossary  to  Hooker  would  be  at  least  ten  times  as  large  as  a 
glossary  to  an  equal  amount  of  writing  by  Sidney.  In  great 
measure,  of  course,  this  is  due  to  the  difference  of  subject.  By 
Swift  he  is  con j tied  with  Parsons  the  Jesuit  as  writing  a  purer 
style  than  other  theologians  of  his  time.  He  did  not  coin  words 
like  Jeremy  Taylor,  nor  employ  them  in  meanings  warranted  by 
derivation  but  not  by  usage — very  common  errors  among  his  more 
pedantic  contemporaries.  His  usages  are  not  peculiar  and  eccen- 
tric. Some  of  his  words — such  as  "  civil "  for  civilised,  "  regi- 
ment "  for  regimen  or  government,  "  put  in  ure  "  for  put  in  use  or 
practice — are  now  obsolete,  but  they  were  good  current  English  in 
his  day.  His  command  of  words  is  good,  but  he  has  not  the  rich 
variety  of  Sidney,  much  less  of  Bacon. 

Sentences. — Hooker  affords  our  first  example  of  an  elaborate 
high-sounding  "periodic  style."  His  sentences,  in  their  general 
character,  are  long  and  involved — an  extreme  contrast  to  the  light 
and  pointed  style  of  John  Lyly,  though  of  their  kind  they  are 
quite  as  finished.  With  all  their  excellences,  they  are  not  good 
models  for  English  periods.  In  writing  our  first  elaborate  theo- 
logical treatise,  his  fine  ear  was  irresistibly  caught  by  the  rhythm 
of  Latin  models ;  and  while  he  learned  from  them  a  more  even 
proportion  of  sentence,  he  learned  also  to  build  an  elaborate  rhythm 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  219 

at  the  expense  of  native  idiom.1  The  following  example  of  his 
"  elaborate  collocation  "  is  quoted  by  Dr  Drake  : — 

"Though  for  no  other  cause,  yet  for  this,  that  posterity  may  know  we 
have  not  loosely,  through  silence,  permitted  things  to  pass  away  as  in  a 
dream,  there  shall  be  for  men's  information,  extant  this  much  concerning 
the  present  state  of  the  Church  of  God  established  amongst  us,  and  their 
careful  endeavours  which  would  have  upheld  the  same." 

Here  the  last  clause  is  very  awkwardly  placed.  In  the  following 
sentence  the  first  clause  is  still  more  awkward,  and  towards  the 
end  the  influence  of  Latin  models  is  still  more  apparent : — 

"And  beyond  seas,  of  them  which  fled  in  the  days  of  Queen  Mary,  some 
contenting  themselves  abroad  with  the  use  of  their  own  service-book  at  home 
authorised  before  their  departure  out  of  the  realm,  others  liking  better  the 
Common  Prayer-book  of  the  Church  of  Geneva  translated,  those  smaller  con- 
tentions before  begun  -were  by  this  means  somewhat  increased." 

In  the  parts  italicised  the  violation  of  English  idiom  and  order 
is  peculiarly  marked.  As  at  least  one-half  of  the  Polity  is  written 
in  this  style,  Hallam  must  have  been  thinking  of  very  select  pas- 
sages when  he  spoke  of  Hooker's  "  racy  idiom." 

Sometimes,  in  his  more  animated  moments,  he  surprises  us  with 
a  run  of  shorter  sentences.  These  occur  but  rarely,  and  are  not 
long  sustained.  The  following  is  an  example  : — 

"  But  wise  men  are  men,  and  the  truth  is  truth.  That  which  Calvin  did 
for  establishment  of  his  discipline,  seemeth  more  commendable  than  that 
which  he  taught  for  the  countenancing  of  it  established.  Nature  worketh 
in  us  all  a  love  to  our  own  counsels.  The  contradiction  of  others  is  a  fan  to 
inflame  that  love.  Our  love  set  on  fire  to  maintain  th;it  which  once  we  have 
done,  sharpeneth  the  wit  to  dispute,  to  argue,  and  by  all  means  to  reason  for 
it.  Wherefore  a  marvel  it  were  if  a  man  of  so  great  capacity,"  &c. 

Here  he  returns  to  his  usual  length  of  sentence.  Occasionally 
we  meet  with  balanced  passages.  In  such  cases,  from  aiming  at 
point,  he  is  more  idiomatic  and  also  less  intricate.  The  follow- 
ing comes  much  nearer  the  modern  standard  than  our  previous 
extracts : — 

"These  men  in  whose  mouths  at  the  first  sounded  nothing  but  mortifica- 
tion of  the  flesh,  were  come  at  the  length  to  think  they  might  lawfully  have 
their  six  or  seven  wives  apiece  ;  they  which  at  the  first  thought  judgment 
and  justice  itself  to  be  merciless  cruelty,  accounted  at  the  length  their  own 
hands  sanctified  with  being  imbrued  in  Christian  blood ;  they  who  at  the 


1  We  have  seen  Hallam's  conception  of  our  author's  sentences.  Dr  Drake's  is 
more  moderate,  and  nearer  the  facts  :  "  Though  the  words  for  the  most  part  are 
well  chosen  and  pure,  the  arrangement  of  them  into  sentences  is  intricate  and 
harsh,  and  formed  almost  exclusively  on  the  idiom  and  construction  of  tlie  Latin. 
Much  strength  and  vigour  are  derived  from  this  adoption;  but  perspicuity, 
sweetness,  and  ease  are  too  generally  sacrificed." 


220  FROM   15SO  TO   1610. 

first  were  wont  to  beat  down  all  dominion,  and  to  urge  against  poor  coir 
stables  'kings  of  nations';  had  at  the  le.ngth  both  consuls  and  kings  of  their 
own  erection  amongst  themselves :  finally,  they  which  could  not  brook  at 
the  first  that  any  man  should  seek,  no  not  by  law,  the  recovery  of  goods 
injuriously  tnken  or  withheld  from  him,  were  grown  at  the  last  to  think 
they  could  not  offer  unto  God  more  acceptable  sacrifice,  than  by  turning 
their  adversaries  clean  out  of  house  and  home,  and  by  enriching  themselves 
with  all  kind  of  spoil  and  pillage  ;  which  thing  being  laid  to  their  charge, 
they  had  in  a  readiness  their  answer,  that  now  the  time  was  come,  when 
according  to  the  Saviour's  promise  'the  meek  ones  must  inherit  tlie  earth  ' ; 
and  that  their  title  hereunto  was  the  same  which  the  righteous  Israelites 
had  unto  the  g  'ods  of  the  wicked  Egyptians." 

His  inversions  sometimes  have  the  effect  of  putting  the  emphatic 
words  in  the  emphatic  places ;  for  example,  in  the  following  harsh 
construction : — 

"  That  which  by  wisdom  he  saw  to  be  requisite  for  that  people,  was  by  as 
great  wisdom  compassed." 

Now  quite  as  good  emphasis  might  be  had  without  such  a 
sacrifice  of  euphony  and  idiom.  But  apart  from  this,  the  theory 
that  all  Ms  inversions  have  this  object  is  not  tenable.  His  con- 
struction is  ruled  chiefly  by  fascination  for  the  rhythm  that  goes 
with  the  Latin  idiom.  Thus,  in  a  sentence  quoted  at  p.  216,  he 
weakens  the  emphasis  by  reserving  the  verb  "  doth  dwell "  to  the 
end,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Latin,  and  that,  too,  when  English 
idiom  permitted  the  inversion.  "Wherein  doth  dwell  nothing  but 
light  and  blessed  immortality,"  <fea,  would  have  been  perfectly 
good  English  idiom,  and  would  have  given  better  emphasis.  But 
Hooker's  ear  was  tuned  to  a  foreign  rhythm.  A  close  examination 
of  almost  any  passage  would  show  great  room  for  improvement  in 
the  way  of  emphasis.  In  no  era  of  English  style  has  much  regard 
been  paid  to  the  placing  of  words  except  for  rhythm. 

In  the  distribution  of  his  matter  into  sentences,  Hooker  is  more 
correct  than  Sidney  is  in  the  Apology.  He  observes  much  better 
the  requirements  of  unity ;  his  aiming  at  the  period  prevented 
rambling.  In  this  respect  he  will  bear  comparison  with  any 
writer  of  the  seventeenth  century ;  it  helps  greatly  to  give  him  a 
modern  air. 

Paragraphs. — Attention  to  clearness  and  simplicity  in  the  struc- 
ture of  paragraphs  was  a  thing  unknown  in  the  age  of  Elizabeth, 
and  Hooker  was  in  this  respect  neither  better  nor  worse  than  the 
good  writers  of  his  time.  Sometimes  when  he  is  dealing  con- 
fusedly with  an  obscure  subject,  the  connection  between  one  sen- 
tence and  another  becomes  very  difficult  to  trace.  Every  sentence 
stands  on  its  own  bottom.  It  would  be  hard  to  find  a  more  hope- 
lessly perplexed  paragraph  than  the  following.  After  close  scru- 
tiny, we  find  that  each  sentence  contains  a  different  idea  from  its 
predecessor :— 


EICHAIJD   HOOKER.  221 

"  Wherefore  to  return  to  our  former  intent  of  discovering  the  natural  way, 
whereby  rules  have  been  found  out  concerning  that  goodness  wherewith  the 
Will  of  man  ought  to  lie  moved  in  human  actions  ;  as  every  thing  natural!  v 
and  necessarily  doth  desire  the  utmost  good  and  ereatest  perfection  win-roof 
Nature  hath  made  it  capable,  even  so  man.  Our  felicity  therefore  being 
the  object  and  accomplishment  of  our  desire,  we  cannot  choose  but  wish 
and  covet  it.  All  particular  things  which  are  subject  unto  action,  the 
Wjll  doth  so  far  incline  unto,  as  Reason  judgeth  them  the  better  for  us, 
and  consequently  the  more  available  to  our  bliss.  If  Reason  err,  we  fall 
into  evil,  and  are  so  far  forth  deprived  of  the  general  perfection  we  seek. 
Seeing  therefore  that  for  the  framing  of  men's  actions  the  knowledge  i«f 
good  from  evil  is  necessary,  it  only  resteth  that  we  search  how  this  may  be 
had.  Neither  must  we  suppose  that  there  needeth  one  rule  to  know  the 
good  and  another  the  evil  by.  For  he  that  knoweth  what  is  straight  doth 
even  thereby  discern  what  is  crooked,  because  the  absence  of  straightness  in 
bodies  capable  thereof  is  crookedness.  Goodness  in  actions  is  like  unto 
straightness ;  wherefore  that  which  is  done  well  we  term  right.  For  as  the 
straight  way  is  most  acceptable  to  him  that  travelleth,  because  by  it  ho 
cometh  soonest  to  his  journey's  end  ;  so  in  action,  that  which  doth  lie  ihe 
eveuest  between  us  and  the  end  we  desire  must  needs  be  the  fittest  for  our 
use.  Besides  which  fitness  for  use,  there  is  also  in  rectitude,  beauty  ; 
as  contrariwise  in  obliquity,  deformity.  And  that  which  4s  good  in  the 
actions  of  men,  doth  not  only  delight  as  profitable,  biit  as  amiable  also. 
In  which  consideration  the  Grecians  most  divinely  have  given  to  the 
active  perfection  of  men  a  name  expressing  both  beauty  and  goodness, 
because  goodness  in  ordinary  speech  is  for  the  most  part  applied  only 
to  that  which  is  beneficial.  But  we  in  the  name  of  goodness  do  here 
imply  both." 

Figures  of  Speech. — So  far  from  being,  as  Hallam  says,  "  rich  in 
figures,"  Hooker  is  for  his  age  singularly  devoid  of  ornament  As 
among  the  great  Elizabethan  writers  his  languid  vitality  is  a 
marked  contrast  to  the  general  plenitude  of  life,  so  his  unadorned 
gravity  of  style  is  a  contrast  to  the  general  figurative  exuberance. 
Similitudes  might  be  quoted  from  him — some  very  apposite,  and 
some  very  pleasing ;  but  the  vein  is  neither  abundant  nor  original. 
His  habitual  personification  of  nature  is  the  manner  of  the  time. 
If  we  regard  law  in  its  strict  scientific  meaning  as  an  express  com- 
mand sanctioned  by  threat  of  punishment,  Hooker's  extension  of 
the  term  to  the  order  of  nature,  the  angelic  manner  of  life,  and 
suchlike,  is  metaphorical;  but  the  metaphor  neither  began  nor 
ended  with  Hooker. 


QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — In  this  as  in  other  respects  Hooker  is  very  unequal 
Taken  all  in  all,  and  compared  with  the  best  English  standards, 
his  style  is  not  readily  intelligible  to  a  modern  reader :  apart  from 
obsolete  words,  which  might  soon  be  mastered,  the  unfamiliar 
Latin  idiom,  and  the  elaborate  accumulation  of  clauses,  make  it 
Btiff  and  perplexing.  This  is  the  general  character  of  his  style ; 


222  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

occasional  passages  are  more  flowing  and  idiomaticv  and  may  be 
read  almost  as  fluently  as  good  modern  prose. 

As  compared  with  the  average  of  his  contemporaries,  he  appears 
to  advantage.  He  is  nearly,  if  not  quite,  free  from  some  of  their 
prevailing  vices ;  he  has  few,  if  any,  pedantic  barbarisms ;  and 
his  pages  are  not  encumbered  with  superfluous  quotation  and 
illustration. 

Clearness. — Speaking  of  Sidney,  we  remarked  that  in  English 
literature,  as  in  every  other,  exact  expression  is  a  thing  of  later 
growth.  In  such  subjects  as  occupied  our  earliest  writers,  nar- 
ratives, practical  treatises — on  hawking,  chess,  shooting — sermons 
on  moral  duties,  and  the  like,  precision  is  not  so  much  a  requisite  ; 
there  is  little  risk  of  confusion.  It  needs  obscure  and  complicated 
subjects  to  test  powers  of  expression.  Not  till  we  come  to  con- 
troversial books  on  Church  doctrine  do  we  feel  the  want  of  clear- 
ness, and  impatiently  consider  how  many  tedious  folio  pages  might 
have  been  anticipated  by  a  little  rigorous  definition  of  terms  at 
the  beginning,  and  a  strict  adherence  to  the  definitions  throughout. 
The  war  of  creeds  and  forms  having  been  waged  for  the  most  part 
in  the  universal  Church  Latin,  Hooker's  '  Ecclesiastical  Polity '  is 
the  first  English  work  that  makes  us  painfully  aware  of  the  con- 
fused thinking  and  confused  expression  of  the  time. 

On  an  easy  subject  Hooker  is  clear  and  orderly.  In  expounding 
a  given  body  of  opinions,  he  is  comprehensive  and  lucid  :  witness 
his  account  of  the  doctrines  of  the  Anabaptists.  Under  a  severe 
strain  of  thought,  he  breaks  down;  he  is  incapable  of  reducing 
confusion  into  order.  His  Puritan  opponents,  Cartwright  and 
Travers,  were  prejudiced  in  favour  of  narrow  principles  that  his 
calmer  mind  readily  felt  to  be  narrow.  But  when  he  tried  to  rest 
his  practical  doctrines  on  broader  principles,  he  only  made  con- 
fusion worse  confounded.  His  opponents  made  their  meaning 
unmistakable ;  Hooker's  real  meaning  remains  somewhat  of  a 
problem  to  this  day.  They  held  that  Scripture  is  the  only  rule  of 
human  conduct,  and  that  Scripture  lays  down  the  Presbyterian 
form  of  Church  government.  Hooker's  purpose  seemingly  was  to 
maintain  that  Scripture  is  not  the  only  rule  of  human  conduct ; 
but  this  he  does  so  vaguely  that  not  many  years  ago  this  purpose 
was  triumphantly  produced  as  "the  key  to  the  philosophy"  of  his 
book.  Had  we  not  happened  to  know  from  history  what  were  the 
doctrines  he  sought  to  refute,  the  exact  drift  of  the  First  Book 
would  have  remained  a  puzzle  to  all  generations.  In  various 
places  he  declares  his  design,  but  in  very  perplexing  language : — 

"  Lest  therefore  any  man  should  marvel  whereunto  all  these  things  tend, 
the  drift  and  purpose  of  all  is  this,  even  to  show  in  what  manner,  as  every 
good  and  perfect  gift,  so  this  very  gift  of  good  and  perfect  laws  is  derived 
from  the  Father  ot  lights  ;  to  teach  men  a  reason  why  just  and  reasonable 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  223 

laws  ate  of  so  great  force,  of  so  great  use  in  the  world ;  and  to  inform  their 
minds  with  some  method  of  reducing  the  laws  whereof  there  is  present  con- 
troversy unto  their  first  original  causes,  that  so  it  maybe  in  every  particular 
ordinance  thereby  the  better  discerned,  whether  the  same  be  reasonable, 
just,  and  righteous,  or  no." 

In  another  place  he  declares  his  purpose  to  be  to  show  that 
"  Scripture  is  not  the  only  law  whereby  God  has  opened  His  will 
touching  all  things  that  may  be  done."  Some  study  enables  us 
to  reconcile  in  some  sort  the  two  declarations  of  purpose ;  but 
in  the  book  itself  he  loses  all  sight  of  this  purpose,  and  frames 
it  as — what  he  elsewhere  declares  it  to  be — an  introduction  to 
solve  "  a  number  of  doubts  and  questions  about  the  nature,  kinds, 
and  qualities  of  laws  in  general." 

This  confusion  of  expression  is  a  thing  apart  from  any  confu- 
sion of  thought ;  on  that  we  do  not  enter  here.  A  farther  evidence 
of  Hooker's  imperfect  expression  is  seen  in  the  opposite  theories  that 
are  fathered  upon  him.  That  so  many  should  take  shelter  under 
his  authority  is  a  proof  of  their  respect,  but  not  of  his  clearness. 

The  emotional  qualities  of  Hooker's  style  may  be  dismissed 
briefly.  He  is  for  the  most  part  intent  upon  quiet  argument, 
quoting  authorities  and  expounding  principles.  It  is  in  the  First 
Book  chiefly  that  we  find  occasional  passages  having  a  poetical 
glow. 

Strength. — Viewed  as  a  definition  and  exposition  «f  the  various 
modes  of  law,  this  First  Book  drew  from  the  scrupulously  clear 
and  exact  John  Austin  the  strong  epithet  of  "  fustian  "  ;  but  what- 
ever be  its  value  in  a  scientific  point  of  view,  undoubtedly  several 
parts  are  written  in  a  highly  poetical  strain  of  subdued  grandeur, 
in  admirable  harmony  with  the  sonorous  dignity  of  the  rhythm. 
The  exciting  causes  of  these  warmer  passages  are  the  author's  ad- 
miration of  beneficent  cosmic  power,  and  his  dread  of  what  might 
happen  were  this  power  withdrawn.  He  shrinks  with  his  whole 
heart  from  every  form  of  jarring  irregularity,  from  everything 
that  disturbs  and  agitates ;  he  worships  whatever  keeps  these 
horrors  in  subjection,  and  admires  warmly  whatever  follows  a  quiet 
and  peaceable  course.  His  conception  of  the  operations  of  nature 
would  be  very  impressive  and  poetical  were  it  not  so  familiar  by 
repetition : — 

"  Although  we  are  not  of  opinion,  therefore,  as  some  are,  that  nature 
in  working  hath  before  her  certain  exemplary  draughts  or  patterns,  which 
subsisting  in  the  bosom  of  the  Highest,  and  being  thence  discovered,  she 
fixeth  her  eye  upon  them,  as  travellers  by  sea  upon  the  pole-star  of  the 
world,  and  that  according  thereunto  she  guideth  .her  hand  to  work  by 
imitation  :  although  we  rather  embrace  the  oracle  of  Hippocrates,  that 
'  each  thing,  both  in  small  and  in  great,  fulfilleth  the  task  which  destiny 
hath  set  down ;'  .  .  .  nevertheless,  forasmuch  as  the  works  of  nature 


224  FROM   1580   TO   1610. 

are  no  less  exact  than  if  she  did  both  behold  and  study  how  to  express  some 
absolute  shape  or  mirror  always  present  before  her  ;  yea,  such  her  dexterity 
and  skill  appeareth,  that  no  intellectual  creature  in  the  world  were  able 
by  capacity  to  do  that  which  nature  doth  without  capacity  and  knowledge. 
It  cannot  be  but  nature  hath  some  director  of  infinite  knowledge  to  guide 
her  in  all  her  ways." 

In  the  above,  the  glow  of  his  admiration  for  order  is  chilled  by 
his  being  compelled  to  own  that  nature  is  an  unconscious  instru- 
ment. He  finds  more  congenial  scope  in  admiring  the  perfect 
obedience  of  the  "  huge,  mighty,  and  royal  armies  "  of  angels. 

His  apprehension  of  a  collapse  of  the  order  of  nature  contains 
some  good  expressions ;  but  the  conclusion,  as  a  piece  of  art,  ia 
very  lame  and  ineffectual— indeed,  an  anti-climax  : — 

"Now  if  nature  should  intermit  her  course,  and  leave  altogether,  though 
it  were  but  for  a  while,  the  observation  of  her  own  laws  ;  if  those  principal 
and  mother  elements  of  the  world,  whereof  all  things  in  this  lower  world  are 
made,  should  lose  the  qualities  which  now  they  have  ;  if  the  frame  of  that 
heavenly  arch  erected  over  our  heads  should  loosen  and  dissolve  itself ;  if 
celestial  spheres  should  forget  their  wonted  motions,  and  by  irregular  volu- 
bility turn  themselves  any  way  as  it  might  happen  ;  if  the  prince  of  the 
lights  of  heaven,  which  now  as  a  giant  doth  run  his  unwearied  course, 
should,  as  it  were,  through  a  languishing  faintness,  begin  to  stand  and  to 
rest  himself;  if  the  moon  should  wander  from  her  beaten  way,  the  times 
and  seasons  of  the  year  blend  themselves  by  disordered  and  confused  mix- 
ture, the  winds  breathe  out  their  last  gasp,  the  clouds  yield  no  rain,  the  earth 
be  defeated  of  heavenly  influence,  the  fruits  of  the  earth  pine  way  as  chil- 
dren at  the  withered  breasts  of  their  mother  no  longer  able  to  yield  them 
relief ; — what  would  become  of  man  himself,  whom  these  things  now  do  all 
serve?  See  we  not  plainly  that  obedience  of  creatures  unto  the  law  of 
nature  is  the  stay  of  the  whole  world?"1 

Pathos. — In  nearly  every  exhibition  of  feeling  in  Hooker's  works 
there  is  a  tinge  of  pathos.  His  craving  for  rest,  quiet,  and  order 
is  perpetually  appearing.  When,  in  his  office  at  the  Temple,  he 
conceived  the  design  of  writing  a  final  defence  of  Episcopacy,  and 
had  read  many  books,  he  made  the  following  pathetic  appeal  to 
Whitgift  :— 

"  But,  my  lord,  I  shall  never  be  able  to  finish  what  1  have  begun,  unless 
I  be  removed  into  some  quiet  country  parsonage,  where  I  may  see  God'a 
blessings  spring  out  of  my  mother  earth,  and  eat  mine  own  bread  iu  peace 
and  privacy. " 

Throughout  his  Polity  we  trace  the  working  of  the  same  spirit 
There  is  a  large  mixture  of  pathos  in  the  examples  that  we  have 
quoted  of  his  loftier  flights.  The  rhapsody  on  law,  which  was  so 

1  This  passage  is  an  instance  of  Hooker's  want  of  originality  and  native  power. 
The  imagined  contusion  of  the  world  is  translated  particular  for  particular  from 
Arnobius,— an  unacknowledged  plagiarism  pointed  out  by  Keble.  Besides  the 
noble  rhythm,  no  part  of  the  vigorous  conception  is  Hooker's  except  the  conclud- 
ing particular.  Arnobius  supposes  the  earth  to  be  too  dry  for  seeds  to  germin- 
ate ;  Hooker  too  dry  to  "  yield  relief  to  her  fruits." 


RICHARD   HOOKER,  225 

distasteful  scientifically  to  John  Austin,  we  regard  with  a  kindlier 
feeling  when  we  keep  in  mind  the  character  of  the  man.  We  see 
a  feeble,  dependent  soul  clinging  with  ecstasy  to  an  idea  that  gives 
him  comfort  and  strength  : — 

"Of  law,  there  can  be  no  less  acknowledged  than  that  her  seat  is  the 
bosom  of  God,  her  voice  the  harmony  of  the  world.  All  things  in  heaven 
and  earth  do  her  homage  ;  the  very  least  as  feeling  her  care,  and  the 
greatest  as  not  exempted  from  her  power.  Botli  angels  and  men,  and 
creatures  of  what  condition  soever,  though  each  in  different  sort  and  manner, 
yet  all  with  uniform  consent,  admiring  her  as  the  mother  of  their  peace  and  . 
ioy." 

Another  favourite  subject  in  a  similar  vein  is  the  desirability  of 
peace  and  unity  between  Puritan  and  Prelatist  — 

"Far  more  comfort  it  were  for  us  (so  small  is  the  joy  we  take  in  these 
strifes)  .  .  .  to  be  joined  with  you  in  bonds  of  indissoluble  love  and 
amity,  to  live  as  if  our  persons  being  many  our  souls  are  but  one,  rather 
than  in  such  dismembered  sort  to  spend  our  few  and  wretched  days  in  a 
tedious  prosecuting  of  wearisome  contentions." 

The  Ludicrous. — Such  a  genuine  lover  of  peace  as  Hooker  was 
not  likely  to  exasperate  by  keen  sarcasm.  And,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  man  of  his  feeble  constitution  was  not  likely  to  have  a 
genial  flow  of  humour,  or  a  broad,  hearty  sense  of  the  ludicrous. 
Such  humour  as  he  has  is  very  faint,  and  takes  a  sarcastic,  ironical 
turn.  In  answering  the  Puritans,  he  states  their  doctrines  gravely, 
very  seldom  allowing  any  trace  of  ridicule  to  cross  his  statement, 
and  even  then  making  the  ridicule  apparent,  not  by  epithets,  but 
by  bringing  ludicrous  incongruities  to  the  surface  in  his  exposi- 
tion. His  manner  was  very  different  from  the  boisterous  wit  of 
Tom  Nash,  a  champion  on  the  same  side.  We  have  seen  one 
example  of  his  irony  (pp.  219-20).  Here  is  another: — 

"Where  they  found  men  in  diet,  attire,  furniture  of  house,  or  any  other 
way,  observers  of  civility  and  decent  order,  such  they  reproved  as  being 
carnally-minded.  Every  word  otherwise  than  severely  and  sadly  uttered 
seemed  to  pierce  like  a  sword  through  them.  If  any  man  were  pleasant, 
their  manner  was  presently  with  deep  sighs  to  repeat  those  words  of  our 
Saviour  Christ,  'Woe  be  to  you  which  now  laugh,  for  ye  shall  lament.' 
So  great  was  their  delight  to  be  always  in  trouble,  that  such  as  did  quietly 
lead  their  lives,  they  judged  of  all  other  men  to  be  in  most  dangerous  case." 

To  quote  one  or  two  passages  like  this  without  any  of  the  con- 
text would  give  an  exaggerated  idea  of  the  power  of  Hooker's 
irony.  Read  with  the  grave  body  of  context,  they  strike  us  as 
but  a  very  slight  departure  from  the  general  gravity.  In  the 
above,  which  is  a  favourable  example,  the  point  is  not  brought 
out  with  equal  force  in  all  the  sentences. 

Melody. — The  general  movement  of  Hooker's  language  is  stiff, 
cumbrous,  but  richly  musical.  Here  and  there,  as  we  have  seen, 

p 


226  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

his  stiffness  relaxes,  and  he  warms  into  flowing  strains  of  solemn 
melody.  The  majority  of  our  quotations  are  favourable  examples 
of  his  rhythm.  The  opening  sentence  of  the  Polity  (p.  219) — 
"  Though  for  no  other  cause,  yet  for  this,"  ttc. — is  a  tine  example 
of  a  crescendo  effect  The  first  sentence  of  his  paragraph  on  the 
angels — "  But  now  that  we  may  lift  up  our  eyes  (as  it  were)  from 
the  footstool  to  the  throne  of  God,"  <fec. — has  something  of  the 
movement  of  the  sentence  in  Sir  Thomas  Browne's  '  Hydriotaphia ' 
that  drew  such  exclamations  of  delight  from  De  Quincey. 

The  great  cause  of  clumsiness  in  his  general  rhythm  is  an  exces- 
sive use  of  heavy  relative  constructions : — 

"That  which  hitherto  we  have  set  down  is  (t  hope)  sufficient  to  show 
their  brutishness  which  imagine  that  religion  and  virtue  are  only  as  men, 
will  account  of  them." 

"Of  what  account  the  Master  of  Sentences  was  in  the  Church  of  Rome, 
the  same  and  more  amongst  the  preachers  of  Reformed  Churches  Calvin  had 
purchased  ;  so  that  the  perfectest  divines  were  judged  they  which  were  skil- 
fullest  in  Calvin's  writings.  .  .  .  Till  at  length  the  discipline,  which 
was  at  the  first  so  weak,  that  without  the  staff  of  their  approbation,  who  were 
not  subject  unto  it  themselves,  it  had  not  brought  others  under  subjection, 
began  now  to  challenge  universal  obedience,  and  to  enter  into  open  conflict 
with  those  very  churches,  which  in  desperate  extremity  had  been  relievers 
of  it."  ^ 

Even  these  passages  are  not  without  a  certain  musical  charm, 
especially  if  we  disregard  the  meaning  and  attend  only  to  the 
succession  of  the  syllables. 

KINDS   OF  COMPOSITION. 

Exposition. — Hooker's  powers  of  exposition  are  tested  by  the 
book  on  Law,  his  most  abstruse  subject.  Viewed  simply  as  a 
piece  of  exposition,  this  book  contains  little  to  profit  the  student 
In  this  particular  respect,  it  is  bad  even  by  the  standard  of  the 
time.  Its  main  faults  have  been  specified  under  the  Paragraph 
and  the  quality  of  Clearness.  The  paragraph  on  the  discovery  of 
rules  of  action,  quoted  to  illustrate  his  worst,  is  a  piece  of  very 
confused  writing.  On  a  subject  requiring  closeness  of  thought, 
he  has  not  the  qualities  that  made  up  for  bad  method  in  some  of 
his  contemporaries ;  he  has  neither  felicity  nor  variety  of  expres- 
sion, nor  fulness  of  example  and  illustration.  These  remarks 
apply  chiefly  to  the  First  Book :  his  imperfect  expression  is  most 
apparent  there.  In  his  arguments  on  ritual  and  doctrine  he  is 
more  on  beaten  ground,  and  proceeds  with  less  confusion. 

Persuasion. — The  'Ecclesiastical  Polity'  is  said  to  have  had 
great  influence.  It  is  a  good  example  to  show  how  much  in  per- 
BURsion  depends  upon  the  manner.  Hooker  added  little  or  nothing 
to  what  Whitgift  had  urged  against  the  Presbyterian  champion, 


JOHN   LYLV.  227 

Cartwright ;  and  in  clearness,  terseness  of  expression,  and  logical 
force,  is  far  inferior  to  his  patron.  His  main  contribution  is  his 
elaborate  and  (in  a  logical  point  of  view)  clumsy  attempt  to  prove 
what  Whitgift  had  simply  asserted  or  taken  for  granted,  that  not 
everything  required  for  the  conduct  of  human  affairs  is  to  be  found 
in  Scripture.  His  arguments  in  the  fa'rst  two  Books  had  little 
weight  with  the  Piiritans.  Once  they  saw  his  drift,  they  admitted 
the  general  propositions,  but  questioned  his  implied  conclusions. 
Law  was  a  good  thing,  and  should  be  obeyed,  but  not  bad  law ; 
not  everything  was  found  in  Scripture — but  the  Presbyterian  gov- 
ernment, and  their  views  about  liturgies,  vestments,  and  sacra- 
ments, were  found  in  Scripture.  While  Hooker's  arguments  were 
neither  new  nor  convincing,  his  moderation,  singular  in  that  age, 
gained  him  a  hearing,  and  his  earnest  advocacy  of  the  blessings  of 
union  and  order  was  like  oil  on  the  troubled  waters.  Whitgift'a 
strenuous  hostility  and  unsparing  rigour  of  argument  set  his 
opponents  on  edge,  and  steeled  them  against  conviction  ;  Hooker's 
mild  and  occasionally  hazy  statement  of  the  same  arguments  won 
the  doubtful  at  once,  and  by  degrees  made  friends  out  of  decided 
enemies. 

JOHN  LYLY  or  LILLEE,  1554-1606. 

This  ingenious  writer  deserves  a  place  of  minor  prominence  in  a 
history  of  prose — partly  from  the  intrinsic  merits  of  his  style,  and 
partly  from  the  voluminous  controversy  that  has  been  raised  upon 
it  He  is  generally  known  as  "  The  Euphuist,"  and  his  style  is 
called  Euphuism.  We  shall  analyse  this  Euphuism,  and  try  to 
make  out  what  it  is,  where  its  elements  came  from,  and  what 
influence  it  had  upon  its  age  as  a  model  of  composition. 

Few  particulars  of  Lyly's  life  are  on  record.  We  know  only 
that  he  was  born  in  Kent,  that  he  was  a  student  at  Magdalen, 
Oxford,  that  he  was  patronised  by  Lord  Burghley,  and  that  from 
1577  to  1593  he  was  a  hanger-on  at  Court  and  wrote  plays.  Hia 
plays  had  no  small  reputation,  coming  immediately  before  Shak- 
speare.  Ben  Jonson  gives  him  honourable  mention ;  and,  in  a 
bookseller's  puff  of  the  next  generation,  he  is  described  as  "  the 
only  rare  poet  of  that  time,  the  witty,  comical,  facetiously  quick 
and  unparalleled  John  Lilly,  Master  of  Arts."  His  chief  work  in 
prose,  apart  from  prose  dramas  and  some  assistance  to  Tom  Nash 
in  the  Marprelate  controversy,  is  a  moral  romance  known  as 
'Euphues'  (whence  his  name  Euphuist).  It  is  in  two  parts, 
'Euphues,  the  Anatomy  of  Wit'  (1579),  and  'Euphues  and  his 
England'  (1580).  Euphues,  a  gay  young  Athenian  of  good  family, 
travels  in  the  first  part  to  Naples,  in  the  seco'nd  part  to  England ; 
the  plot  is  subservient  to  the  development  of  the  young  man's 
U'oral  nature,  and  gives  occasion  for  discourses  on  religion,  educa- 


228  FROM    1580  TO   1610. 

tion,  friendship,  and  other  virtues,  with  a  great  many  love-passages. 
The  book  suited  the  taste  of  the  time,  and  was  popular :  according 
to  Blount  the  bookseller,  "  all  our  Ladies  were  then  his  Scholars ; 
and  that  Beauty  in  Court  which  could  not  parley  Euphuism  was 
as  little  regarded  as  she  which  now"  (1632)  "speaks  not  French." 
With  all  his  popularity  the  ingenious,  gentle,  humorous  little  man 
received  no  solid  patronage.  There  are  extant  two  petitions  of  his 
to  the  Queen  complaining  of  his  deferred  hopes  of  favour.  He 
had  hung  on  for  thirteen  years  in  hopes  of  getting  the  Mastership 
of  the  Revels;  and  in  his  second  petition  (1593),  despairing  of 
this,  he  begs — 

"Some  land,  some  good  fines,  or  forfeitures  that  should  fall  hy  the  just 
fall  of  these  most  i'alse  traitors,  that  seeing  nothing  will  come  by  the  Revels, 
I  may  prey  upon  the  Rebels.  Thirteen  years  your  Highness"  servant,  but 
yet  nothing.  Twenty  friends  that  though  they  say  they  will  be  sure  I  find 
them  sure  to  be  slow.  A  thousand  hopes  but  all  nothing ;  a  hundred  pro- 
mises but  y<-t  nothing.  Thus  casting  up  the  inventory  of  my  friends,  hopes, 
promises,  and  times,  the  summn  totalis  amounteth  to  just  nothing.  My 
last  will  is  shorter  than  mine  invention  :  but  three  legacies,  patience  to  my 
creditors,  melancholy  without  measure  to  my  friends,  and  beggary  without 
shame  to  my  family." 

What  were  his  fortunes  after  this,  whether  Elizabeth  heard  his 
petition,  is  not  known.  Probably  the  frugal  Queen  gave  him 
some  relief.  His  admiring  bookseller  says,  though  without  express 
reference  to  the  petition,  that  he  was  "  heard,  graced,  and  re- 
warded." He  died  at  the  comparatively  early  age  of  fifty-two. 

The  interest  in  Lyly  was  revived  in  this  century  by  Sir  Walter 
Scott's  attempt  to  reproduce  a  Euphuist  in  the  person  of  Sir 
Piercie  Shafton.  In  the  heat  of  attacking  and  defending  Lyly 
and  his  style,  of  arguing  as  to  whether  he  invented  Euphuism  or 
only  fell  in  with  a  ruling  taste,  whether  he  vitiated  our  language 
or  caught  a  taint,  the  disputants  have  not  always  kept  in  view 
what  peculiarly  belongs  to  Lyly's  mannerism  and  what  does  not. 
His  style  lias  good  points  and  bad  points,  peculiar  affectations 
and  affectations  common  to  the  age.  A  discussion  on  Euphuism 
becomes  hopelessly  tangled  and  complicated  unless  the  leading 
elements  of  his  manner  are  kept  distinct  Here  it  may  be  well, 
without  pretending  to  give  an  exhaustive  analysis,  to  distinguish 
some  particulars  that  should  not  be  confused.  Three  or  four  may 
be  specified. 

(i.)  Neatness  and  finish  of  sentence. — Lyly's  sentences  are  re- 
markably free  from  intricacy  and  inversion,  much  shorter,  more 
pithy  and  direct  than  was  usual.  We  must  come  down  at  least  a 
century  before  we  find  a  structure  so  lucid.  To  be  sure,  his  matter 
was  not  heavy,  and  did  not  tempt  him  to  use  either  weighty 
sentences  or  learned  terms :  still,  credit  to  \vhom  credit  is  due ; 


JOHN   LYLY.  229 

his  sentences,  as  sentences,  though  not  in  perfect  modern  form, 
are  the  most  smooth  and  finished  of  that  time.  His  chief  fault  is 
the  want  of  variety,  "  an  eternal  affectation  of  sententiousness," 
says  an  old  critic,  "  keeps  to  such  a  formal  measure  of  his  periods 
as  soon  grows  tiresome,  and  so  by  confining  himself  to  shape  his 
sense  so  frequently  into  one  artificial  cadence,  however  ingenious 
or  harmonious,  abridges  that  variety  which  the  style  should  be 
admired  for." 

(2.)  Fanciful  antithesis  and  word-play.  —  The  passage  above 
quoted  from  his  petition  to  Elizabeth  is  an  extreme  example.  In 
the  '  Euj times '  there  are  few  passages  so  fantastically  antithetical ; 
the  antithesis  of  the  '  Euphues  '  is  more  a  kind  of  balance  in  the 
clauses,  with  or  without  opposition  in  the  matter.  Thus,  when 
young  Euphues  is  counselled  by  aged  Philautus,  he  replies : — 

' '  Father  and  friend  (your  age  showeth  the  one,  your  honesty  the  other), 
I  am  neither  so  suspicious  to  mistrust  your  goodwill,  nor  so  sottish  to  mis- 
like  your  good  counsel.  As  I  am  therefore  to  thank  you  for  the  first,  so  it 
stands  upon  me  to  think  better  on  the  latter.  I  mean  not  to  cavil  with  you 
as  one  loving  sophistry:  neither  to  control  you,  as  one  having  superiority; 
the  one  would  bring  my  talk  into  the  suspicion  of  fraud,  the  other  convince 
me  of  folly." 

When  Euphues  rejects  the  good  advice,  Lyly  moralises  thus : — 

"Here  ye  may  behold,  Gentlemen,  how  lewdly  wit  standeth  in  his  own 
light,  how  he  deemeth  no  penny  good  silver  but  his  own,  preferring  the 
blossom  before  the  fruit,  the  bud  before  the  flower,  the  green  blade  before 
the  ripe  ear  of  com,  his  own  wit  before  all  men's  wisdoms.  Neither  is  that 
reason,  seeing  for  the  most  part  it  is  proper  to  all  those  of  sharp  capacity  to 
esteem  of  themselves  as  most  proper:  if  one  be  hard  in  conceiving,  they 
pronounce  him  a  dolt ;  if  given  to  study,  they  proclaim  him  a  duuce :  if 
merry,  a  jester  :  if  sad,  a  saint :  if  full  of  words,  a  sot :  if  without  speech,  a 
cipher.  If  one  argue  with  them  boldly,  then  he  is  impudent :  if  coldly,  an 
innocent :  if  there  be  reasoning  of  divinity,  they  cry,  Quce  supra  nos,  nihil 
ad  nos ;  if  of  humanity,  seittentias  loquitur  caniifex." 

Lyly  did  not  invent  this  measured  balance :  like  Johnson,  he  only 
took  up,  trimmed,  and  carried  to  excess  a  structure  that  others 
used  in  a  rougher  form  and  less  frequently.  A  more  measured, 
neat,  pointed,  and  ornate  style  of  prose  was  imported  from  Italy 
in  Henry  VIIL's  reign  by  scholars  and  travelled  men  of  fashion 
(p.  189).  It  appears  in  our  literature  long  before  Lyly.  It  would 
seem  to  have  been  encouraged  by  Elizabeth.1  We  see  how  Lyly 
strained  his  wit  to  gain  her  favour;  and  in  1567,  a  quarter  of  a 

1  An  ahle  monograph  by  Heir  F.  Landmann  (Der  Euphuismv*,  Giefsen, 
Keller,  1881)  traces  Lyly's  '  Euphuism  '  back  to  Antonio  de  Guevara's  '  Golden 
Book  of  Marcus  Aurelius '  (see  ante,  p.  198).  Of  this  Spanish  prose  romance 
Herr  Landmann  regards  '  Euphues '  as  an  imitation  both  in  matter  and  in  manner. 
This  is  so  far  true  :  still  Lyly's  "  Euphuism  "  has  distinction  enough  to  deserve 
credit  as  something  more  than  an  imitation — as  a  marked  variety  in  a  peculiar 
kind. 


230  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

century  before,  we  find  Roger  Ascham  exerting  himself  as  follows. 
The  letter  is  addressed  to  Elizabeth,  though  she  is  in  the  third 
person,  and  it  has  the  same  object  as  Lyly's  petition : — 

"I  wrote  once  a  little  book  of  shooting:  King  HENRY,  her  most  nobla 
father,  did  so  well  like  and  allow  it,  as  he  gave  me  a  living  for  it ;  when  he 
lost  his  life  I  lost  my  living  ;  but  noble  King  Edward  again  did  first  revive 
it  by  his  goodness,  then  did  increase  it  by  his  liberality ;  thirdly,  did  con- 
firm it  by  liis  authority  under  the  great  seal  of  England,  which  patent  all 
this  time  was  both  a  great  pleasure  and  profit  to  me,  saving  that  one  un- 
pleasant word  in  that  patent,  called  '  during  pleasure,"  turned  ine  after  to 
great  displeasure  ;  for  when  King  EDWARD  went,  his  pleasure  went  with 
him,  and  my  whole  living  went  away  with  them  both." 

Here  we  have  the  same  striving  at  verbal  conceits — differing  from 
Lyly's  only  in  being  less  ingenious  and  polished.  Lyly,  it  is  clear, 
cannot  be  charged  either  with  inventing  this  affectation  or  with 
introducing  it  to  Court. 

(3.)  Excess  of  similitudes,  parallels,  and  instances. — This  is  the 
most  striking  part  of  Lyly's  mannerism.  It  is  for  this  that  he  is 
censured  by  Sidney,  and  accused  of  "  rifling  up  all  Herbarists,  all 
stories  of  beasts,  fowls,  and  fishes."  To  the  same  effect  he  is 
attacked  by  Michael  Drayton :  while  Sidney  is  praised  because 
he— 

"  Did  first  reduce 

Our  tongue  from  Lillie's  writing  then  in  use ; 

Talking  of  stories,  stars,  plants,  of  fishes,  flies, 

Playing  with  words,  and  idle  similies. " 

Not  only  does  Lyly  ransack  natural  history  for  comparisons,  he 
even  goes  the  length  of  inventing  natural  history  ;  at  least,  whether 
he  is  the  inventor  or  not,  many  of  his  comparisons  refer  to  fabu- 
lous properties.  The  following  are  examples.  Take  first "  Euphues 
to  the  Gentlemen  Scholars  of  Athens." 

"  The  merchant  that  travelleth  for  gain,  the  husbandman  that  toileth  for 
increase,  the  lawyer  that  pleadeth  for  gold,  the  craftsman  that  seeketh  to 
live  by  his  labour — all  these,  after  they  have  fatted  themselves  with  suffi- 
cient, either  take  their  ease,  or  less  pain  than  they  were  accustomed. 
llippmnofiies  ceased  to  run  when  he  had  gotten  the  goal.  Hercules  to  labour 
when  he  had  obtained  the  victory.  Mercury  to  pipe  when  he  had  cast 
Argils  in  a  slumber.  The  ant,  though  she  toil  in  summer,  yet  in  winter 
she  leaveth  to  travail.  The  bee,  though  she  delight  to  suck  the  fair  flower, 
yet  is  she  at  last  cloyed  with  honey.  The  spider  that  weaveth  the  finest 
thread  ceaseth  at  the  last  when  she  hath  finished  her  web.  But  in  the 
action  and  study  of  the  mind  (Gentlemen)  it  is  far  otherwise,  for  he  that 
tasteth  the  sweet  of  learning  endureth  all  the  sour  of  labour.  He  that 
seeketh  the  depth  of  knowledge,  is  as  it  were  in  a  Labyrinth,  in  the  which 
the  farther  he  goeth,  the  farther  he  is  from  the  end :  or  like  the  bird  in 
the  lime-bush,  which,  the  more  she  striveth  to  get  out,  the  faster  she 
sticketh  in.  And  certainly  it  may  be  said  of  learning  as  it  was  feigned 
of  Nrctar,  the  drink  of  the  Gods,  the  which  the  more  it  was  drunk,  the 
more  it  would  overflow  t)>«  biim  of  the  cup;  neither  is  it  far  unlike  the 


JOHN  LYLT.  231 

stone  that  groweth  in  the  river  of  Caria,  the  which  the  more  it  is  cut  tha 
more  it  increaseth.  And  it  fareth  with  him  that  followeth  it  as  with 
him  that  hath  the  dropsy,"  &c. 

Euphues  having  been  rather  sharply  reproached  with  inconsis- 
tency by  his  friend  Philautus,  makes  the  following  reply : — 

"  The  admonition  of  a  true  friend  should  be  like  the  practice  of  a  wise 
physician,  who  wrappeth  his  sharp  pills  in  fine  sugar ;  or  the  cunning  Chir- 
urgeon,  who  lancing  a  wound  with  an  iron,  immediately  applieth  to  it 
soft  lint ;  or  as  mothers  deal  with  their  children  for  worms,  who  put  their 
bitter  seeds  into  sweet  raisins.  If  this  order  had  been  observed  in  thy 
discourse,  that  interlacing  sour  taunts  with  sugared  counsel,  bearing  as 
well  a  gentle  rein  as  using  a  hard  snaffle,  thou  miyhtest  have  done  more 
with  the  whisk  of  a  wand,  than  now  thou  canst  with  the  prick  of  the  spur, 
and  avoid  that  which  now  thou  mayest  not,  extreme  unkindness.  But 
thou  art  like  that  kind  judge  which  Propertius  noteth,  who  condemning 
his  friend,  caused  him  for  the  more  ease  to  be  hanged  with  a  silken  twist. 
And  thou  like  a  friend  cuttest  my  throat  with  a  razor,  not  with  a  hatchet, 
for  my  more  honour.  But  why  should  I  set  down  the  office  of  a  friend, 
when  thou,  like  our  Athenians,"  &c. 

The  following  is  what  we  may  suppose  to  have  been  imitated  by 
the  gallants  of  the  Court : — 

"  For  as  the  hop,  the  pole  being  never  so  high,  groweth  to  the  end,  or 
as  the  dry  beech  kindled  at  the  root  never  leaveth  until  it  come  to  the 
top  :  or  as  one  drop  of  poison  disperseth  itself  into  every  vein,  so  affec- 
tion having  caught  hold  of  my  heart,  and  the  sparkles  of  love  kindled 
my  liver,  will  suddenly,  though  secretly,  flame  up  into  my  head,  and 
spread  itself  into  every  sinew.' 

"  What  cruelty  more  unfit  for  so  comely  a  lady  than  to  spur  him  that 
galloped,  or  to  let  him  blood  in  the  heart,  whose  vein  she  should  have 
staunched  in  the  liver  f  But  it  fared  with  me  as  with  the  herb  basil,  the 
which  the  more  it  is  crushed,  the  sooner  it  springeth  ;  or  the  rue,  which 
the  oftener  it  is  cut  the  better  it  groweth ;  or  the  poppy,  which  the  more 
it  is  trodden  with  the  feet,  the  more  it  flourisheth. " 

It  serves  no  good  purpose  to  apply  the  term  Euphuism  to  any- 
thing but  the  tricks  of  style  characteristic  of  Lyly,  the  author  of 
'  Euphues.'  We  only  make  confusion  when  we  apply  the  name 
to  quaint  punning  and  antithesis,  or  to  superabundance  of  illustra- 
tion and  exemplification.  These  faults,  such  as  they  were,  Lyly 
shared  with  his  time.  His  peculiarity  lay  not  so  much  in  hosts  of 
parallels  and  instances,  as  in  the  sententious  pointed  way  of  ex- 
pressing them.  That  is  the  Euphuistic  form:  the  Euphuistic 
substance  is  the  copious  illustration  of  everything  pertaining  to 
man  from  animals,  plants,  and  minerals,  real  or  fabulous.  The 
form  and  substance  taken  together  constitute  Euphuism  proper, 
the  real  invention  of  Lyly,  and,  it  would  appear,  for  some  short 
time  the  fashionable  affectation  at  Court. 

If  by  Euphuism  we  understand,  as  seems  most  reasonable,  tlie 
peculiar  manner  of  the  author  of  '  Euphues,'  we  cannot  accept  Mr 


232  FROM    1580  TO   1610. 

Marsh's  statement  that  "  the  quality  of  style  called  Euphuism  has 
more  or  less  prevailed  in  all  later  periods  of  English  literature." 
It  is  quite  true  that  ingenious  playing  upon  words  has  been  a 
favourite  practice  "in  all  later  periods  of  English  literature." 
But  Lyly's  style  had  very  little  influence  on  literature,  either  for 
evil  or  for  good.  All  sorts  of  antithetical  pranks  with  words 
prevailed  before  he  wrote,  especially  in  the  language  of  gallantry, 
ridiculed  in  'Love's  Labour  Lost.'  To  this  affectation  he  pro- 
bably added  nothing  but  greater  polish  of  form.  His  similitudes 
from  nature,  whether  simple,  far-fetched,  or  spurious,  were  so 
overdone  that  the  evil  wrought  its  own  cure.  There  were  pro- 
bably Euphuists  in  private  circles  and  among  inferior  writers ; 
but  in  higher,  and  even  in  middling  literature,  the  a.ffectation  was 
too  excessive  to  last,  too  characteristic  to  be  imitated.  Further, 
even  the  good  points  were  not  imitated.  Mannerists  like  John- 
son, Macaulay,  or  Carlyle,  have  an  influence  for  good  on  many 
that  do  not  adopt  their  most  startling  peculiarities.  But  Lyly's 
example  carried  no  weight ;  his  lucid  neatness  of  sentence,  and 
orderly  way  of  producing  instances,  perished  with  his  worthless 
affectations.  English  style  immediately  after  him  was  not  less 
prolix  and  intricate,  nor  less  overburdened  with  clumsy  quota- 
tions, than  it  was  before  him. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  the  style  of  Scott's  "  Piercie 
Shat'ton  "  is  far  from  being  a  reproduction  of  Euphuism  as  it  is  in 
Lyly.  Perhaps  the  nearest  prototype  of  Shafton  is  Sidney's  cari- 
cature of  a  pedantic  schoolmaster  "  Rhombus "  in  '  The  Lady  of 
the  May.' 1 

OTHER  WRITERS. 

CHURCH    CONTROVERSIALISTS — 1580-1600. 

Some  of  the  writers  now  to  be  mentioned  wrote  before  the  year 
1580;  all  of  them  wrote  after  it.  The  struggle  between  the  two 
Church  parties  passed  through  a  crisis  in  the  latter  part  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign.  Hooker,  as  we  have  seen,  was  the  chief  literary 
champion  of  Episcopacy:  in  their  capacity  as  writers,  the  others 
may  be  clustered  round  him. 

John  Whitgift,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  1530-1604,  did  prob- 
ably more  than  any  one  man  to,  establish  the  Church  of  England. 
He  was  born  in  Lincolnshire,  and  studied  at  Cambridge.  During 
the  first  half  of  Elizabeth's  reign  he  rose  to  distinction,  filling  im- 
portant offices  in  the  University.  He  was  made  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury  in  1583,  and  distinguished  himself  by  his  rigorous 

1  Lyly's  '  Euphues '  is  issued  in  Mr  Arber's  series  of  English  Reprints,  with 
a  useful  Introduction,  containing  several  notices  of  Euphuism  at  different  dates. 
Mrs  Humphrey  Ward  has  made  a  careful  study  of  Lyly  for  the  '  Encyclopaedia 
Uritannica.' 


CHURCH   CONTROVERSIALISTS.  233 

policy  against  the  Presbyterians.  His  '  Defence  of  his  Answer  to 
Cartwright's  Admonition,'  first  published  in  1574,  is  reprinted  by 
the  Parker  Society.  A  strenuous,  sagacious  man,  he  writes  a  vig- 
orous, straightforward,  and  clear  style,  seasoned  with  open  personal 
invective  and  ridicule.  His  sentences,  without  being  made  after 
any  peculiar  form,  are  short  and  simple  :  he  keeps  too  close  a  grasp 
on  the  argument,  and  is  too  eagerly  bent  upon  refuting,  to  have 
time  for  the  elaboration  of  periods. 

Thomas  Cartwright  (1535-1603),  "the  incarnation  of  Presbyte- 
rianism,"  and  for  some  time  a  thorn  in  the  side  of  Whitgift,  was 
born  in  Hertfordshire.  He  encountered  Whitgift  at  Cambridge, 
and  was  worsted,  being  deprived  of  the  Lady  Margaret  Professor- 
ship and  of  his  fellowship  in  Trinity,  and  thus  driven  from  the 
University  in  1572.  After  spending  some  years  as  English  Chap- 
lain at  Antwerp,  he  returned,  got  into  trouble  with  the  Church, 
and  was  imprisoned.  In  his  later  years  he  seems  to  have  been 
conciliated  by  Whitgift,  and  to  have  made  a  less  violent  opposi- 
tion. His  works  are — 'An  Admonition  to  Parliament,'  1572  ;  'An 
Admonition  to  the  People  of  England,'  1589  ;  'A  Brief  Apology,' 
1596  ;  also  '  A  Directory  of  Church  Government,'  and  'A  Body  of 
Divinity,'  published  after  his  death.  Cartwright  was  a  very  poj>- 
ular  preacher.  He  writes  with  great  fervour,  but  his  style  is  much 
more  involved  and  antiquated  than  Whitgift's,  and  he  has  much 
less  argumentative  force. 

Martin  Marprelate  wrote  some  virulent,  coarsely  humorous 
personal  tracts  on  the  Puritan  side  about  the  time  of  the  Spanish 
Armada  (1588).  Martin's  real  name  is  a  greater  mystery  than 
Junius ;  the  latest  conjecture  is  that  he  was  a  Jesuit  At  one 
time  he  was  identified  with  John  Penry,  who  seems  to  have  been 
a  mild,  much-suffering  Puritan  Welshman,  quite  incapable  of  any- 
thing so  boisterous.  The  titles  of  the  tracts  are  such  as  "The 
Epitome,"  "  The  Supplication,"  "  Hay  any  Work  for  a  Cooper  ?  " 
Martin  was.  answered  in  an  equally  personal  strain  by  "  witty  TOM 
NASH,"  who  chose  such  titles  as  "An  Almond  for  a  Parrot"  (equi- 
valent to  "  A  sop  for  Cerberus  "),  and  "  Pap  with  a  Hatchet "  l  (an 
expression  for  doing  a  kind  thing  in  an  unkind  way). 

Robert  Parsons  or  Persons  (1546-1610),  the  daring  and  skilful 
pioneer  of  the  Jesuits  in  England,  is  praised  by  Swift  for  the 
purity  and  vigour  of  his  English  style.  A  native  of  Somersetshire, 
he  was  educated  at  Oxford,  and  became  a  celebrated  tutor.  Being 
expelled  from  his  College  in  1574  (according  to  Fuller,  for  em- 
bezzlement of  College  money),  he  joined  the  Jesuits,  and  was  the 
moving  spirit  of  the  Popish  plots  against  Elizabeth  before  the 
Spanish  Armada.  In  his  later  years  he  presided  over  the  English 
College  at  Roma 

1  Sometimes  ascribed  to  Lyly,  the  Euphuist. 


234  FEOM   1580  TO   1610. 

CHRONICLES,    HISTORY,    ANTIQUITIES. 

The  series  of  Chroniclers  is  continued  in  this  period  by  John 
Stow  (1525-1605)  and  John  Speed  (1552-1629),  both  tailors  by 
trade.  Stow,  a  genial  industrious  creature,  after  publishing  a 
'Summary  of  English  Chronicles'  in  1565,  became  ambitious  to 
write  a  great  chronicle  of  England  that  should  surpass  every  other 
in  number  and  accuracy  of  facts,  quitted  his  tailor's  board,  and 
walked  through  England  searching  for  documents  that  had  been 
dispersed  by  the  suppression  of  the  monasteries.  His  great  work 
was  never  published,  but  in  1598  he  brought  out  a  'Survey  of 
London,'  which  was  the  basis  of  subsequent  accounts  of  the 
metropolis,  and  in  1600  '  Flores  Historiarum,'  The  Flowers  of  the 
Histories  (of  England).  In  his  last  years  he  received  from  King 
James  a  recommendation  to  the  charity  of  the  public,  and  stood  in 
churches  to  receive  alms — so  ill  was  his  humble  industry  rewarded. 
With  all  his  diligence  he  is  said  to  have  been  able  to  add  little  to 
the  stock  of  chronicled  facts. — Speed  seems  to  have  lived  more 
comfortably,  and,  working  with  equal  industry,  to  have  been  more 
discriminating  in  his  choice  of  authorities.1  He  published  a  '  His- 
tory of  Great  Britain'  in  1614.  Previously,  in  1606,  he  had  pub- 
lished a  Collection  of  Maps,  including  maps  of  the  English  shires, 
each  map  curiously  bordered  with  drawings  of  inhabitants,  towns, 
notable  buildings,  &c.  The  balanced  structure  of  his  titles  is  char- 
acteristic of  the  time.  His  Map  of  the  World  is  "  drawn  according 
to  the  truest  descriptions,  latest  discoveries,  and  best  observations 
that  have  been  made  by  English  or  strangers ;  "  the  outlines  of  the 
Great  Southern  Continent  "  rather  show  there  is  a  land,  than  descry 
either  land,  people,  or  commodities." 

Three  writers,  who  pretend  to  a  weightier  style  than  Stow  or 
Speed,  may  be  called  HISTORIANS.  Sir  John  Hayward  (1560- 
1627),  LL.D.  of  Cambridge,  was  patronised  by  Essex,  imprisoned 
by  Elizabeth,  knighted  by  James,  and  made  one  of  the  two  histori- 
ographers of  the  abortive  Chelsea  College.  He  wrote'a  '  Life  and 
Reign  of  Henry  IV.'  (1599);  'Lives  of  the  three  Norman  Kings 
of  England'  (1613);  and  a  'Complete  History  of  Edward  IV.,' 
with  '  Certain  Years  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  lieign,'  published  in 
1630,  after  his  death.  Hayward  was  the  subject  of  one  of  Bacon's 
apothegms.  Elizabeth,  much  incensed  at  his  history,  asked 
"Whether  there  were  no  treason  contained  in  it?"  "No,  ma- 
dam," answered  Bacon,  "for  treason,  I  cannot  deliver  opinion  that 
there  is  any,  but  very  much  felony."  "How  and  wherein?" 

1  Speed's  superior  accuracy  and  rejection  of  fables  is  no  doubt  partly  due  to 
his  having  had  the  advice  of  Sir  Robert  Cotton  (1570-1631),  a  man  of  property 
and  good  position,  who  made  it  his  hobby  to  collect  every  sort  of  document  re- 
lating' to  the  history  of  England. 


CHRONICLERS.  235 

"  Because  he  has  stolen  many  of  his  sentences  and  conceits  out  nf 
Cornelius  Tacitus."  Jeremy  Taylor  in  return  did  Hay  ward  the 
honour  to  steal  some  ideas  from  his  '  Sanctuary  of  a  Troubled 
Soul.'  Richard  Knolles  (1549-1610),  Fellow  of  Lincoln,  Oxford, 
and  Master  of  the  Free  School  at  Sandwich,  wrote  a  '  History  of 
the  Turks,'  and  other  works  relating  to  the  Ottoman  Empire. 
Johnson,  who  read  Knolles  for  his  '  Irene,'  in  a  paper  on  History 
('Rambler,'  122),  says:  "None  of  our  writers"  (of  history)  "can, 
in  my  opinion,  justly  contest  the  superiority  of  Knolles,  who,  in 
his  'History  of  the  Turks,'  has  displayed  all  the  excellencies  that 
narration  can  admit.  His  style,  though  somewhat  obscured  by 
time,  and  sometimes  vitiated  by  false  wit,  is  pure,  nervous,  elevated, 
and  clear.  A  wonderful  multiplicity  of  events  is  so  artfully  arranged, 
and  so  distinctly  explained,  that  each  facilitates  the  knowledge  of 
the  next.  Whenever  a  new  personage  is  introduced,  the  reader  is 
prepared  by  his  character  for  his  actions ;  when  a  nation  is  first 
attacked,  or  city  besieged,  he  is  made  acquainted  with  its  history 
or  situation ;  so  that  a  great  part  of  the  world  is  brought  into 
view."  The  estimate  is  excessive,  even  as  made  in  Johnson's  tima 
The  distinctness  of  arrangement,  and  the  geographical  sketches, 
were  due  more  to  the  character  of  the  subject  than  to  any  superi- 
ority of  method  :  these  "  excellencies  "  were  easy  in  narrating  the 
steps  of  a  conquest  through  a  foreign  country.  Knolles's  sentences 
are  long  and  rambling — prolonged  by  successive  relative  clauses 
starting  each  from  the  one  that  goes  before.  Samuel  Daniel 
(1562-1619),  the  poet,  wrote  a  '  History  of  England  from  the  Con- 
quest to  the  Accession  of  Henry  VII.'  It  is  praised  by  Hallam  for 
its  purity  of  diction,  being  written  in  the  current  English  of  the 
Court,  and  free  from  scholarly  stiffness  and  pedantry.  The  struc- 
ture of  the  sentences  is  easy  to  the  extent  of  negligence. 

Two  or  three  ANTIQUARIES  are  usually  mentioned  among  the 
prose  writers  of  this  period;  perhaps  because,  though  they  wrote 
chiefly  in  Latin  themselves,  they  furnished  materials  for  the  Eng- 
lish prose  of  other  writers.  William  Camden  (1551-1623),  Head- 
master of  Westminster  School,  wrote  the  '  Britannia,'  and  founded 
a  Chair  of  History  in  Oxford.  Sir  Henry  Spelman  (1562-1604), 
Sheriff  of  Norfolk,  a  legal  and  ecclesiastical  antiquary,  is  famed  as 
a  restorer  of  Saxon  literature,  having  founded  a  Saxon  Professor- 
ship at  Cambridge.  Sir  Robert  Cotton  has  been  already  men- 
tioned as  a  collector  of  historical  documents ;  he  is  not  said  to  have 
written  anything. 

CHRONICLERS  OF  MARITIME  DISCOVERY. — The  enterprising  naval 
worthies  in  the  reigns  of  Elizabeth  and  James,  if  they  had  no  poet, 
were  not  without  their  chroniclers.  Many ,  of  their  voyages  to 
"descry  new  lands"  in  America,  or  in  the  Southern  Continent, 
have  been  put  on  record.  The  chief  of  this  department  of  history 


236  FROM   1580   TO    1610. 

is  Richard  Hakluyt  (1553-1616),  Lecturer  on  Cosmography  at 
Oxford,  and  an  nctive  correspondent  with  the  foreign  geographers, 
Ortelius  and  Mereator.  In  1598,  1599,  and  1600,  he  published 
'  The  Principal  Navigations,  Voyages,  Traffiques,  and  Discoveries 
of  the  English  Nation,  made  by  Sea  or  over  Land,  to  the  Remote 
and  Farthest  Distant  Quarters  of  the  Earth,  within  the  compass  of 
these  1500  years.'  Very  interesting  reading  for  persons  with  the 
proper  taste  for  their  subject-matter,  Hakluyt's  narratives  have  no 
charms  of  style.  The  same  may  be  said  of  Samuel  Purchas  (1577- 
1628),  '  Hackluytns  Posthumus,'  B.D.  of  Cambridge,  who  continued 
Hackluyt,  and  wrote  'Purchas  his  Pilgrimage,' containing  an  account 
of  all  the  religions  of  the  world. 

Some  of  the  hardy  mariners  told  their  own  story— as  John  Davia 
(of  Davis  Straits,  an  early  searcher  for  the  North- West  Passage), 
and  Sir  Richard  Hawkins,  who  went  in  quest  of  land  to  the  south. 
Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  the  "  discoverer  of  Guiana,"  will  be  mentioned 
presently. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

The  versatile  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  (1552-1618)  wrote  some  of  the 
most  flowing  and  modern-looking  prose  of  this  period  ;  and  had  his 
subject-matter  been  less  antiquated,  we  should  have  gone  over  his 
peculiarities  at  some  length.  He  is,  perhaps,  the  most  dazzling 
figure  of  his  time  :  his  high  position  at  the  Court  of  Elizabeth, 
gained  not  by  birth,  but  by  personal  charms  and  merits ;  his  con- 
duct against  the  Armada  and  at  Cadiz  ;  his  American  enterprises ; 
his  two  new  imports,  tobacco  and  the  potato  ;  his  unjust  imprison- 
ment by  King  James, — made  him  to  the  people  of  London  the 
most  wonderful  of  living  men  ;  and  he  still  holds  the  highest  rank 
among  our  traditional  heroes.  His  principal  writings  are — '  The 
Discovery  of  the  large,  rich,  and  beautiful  Empire  of  Guiana,' 
published  in  1596,  and  his  '  History  of  the  World,'  composed  dur- 
ing his  imprisonment.  The  '  Discovery'  is  a  matter-of-fact  record 
of  his  own  voyage,  his  dealings  with  the  natives,  and  his  impres- 
sions of  the  scenery.  It  was  much  ridiculed  at  the  time  by  his 
jealous  enemies,  but  there  is  nothing  incredible  in  what  he  pro- 
fesses to  have  seen,  though  he  was  too  sanguine  in  his  beliefs  as 
to  the  splendour  of  the  parts  of  the  empire  that  he  had  not  seen. 
As  regards  the  style,  he  "  neither  studied  phrase,  form,  nor 
fashion  ; "  yet  at  times  he  shows  his  natural  power  of  graphic 
description.  The  following  is  perhaps  his  best ;  he  describes  the 
" overfalls  of  the  river  of  Carol i,  which  roared  so  far  off": — 

"  When  we  ran  to  the  tops  of  the  first  hills  of  the  plains  adjoining  to  the 
river,  we  beheld  that  wonderful  breach  of  waters,  which  ran  down  Caroli ; 
and  might  from  that  mountain  see  the  river  how  it  ran  in  three  parts,  above 
twenty  miles  off,  and  there  appeared  some  ten  or  twelve  overfalls  in  sight, 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  237 

every  one  as  high  over  the  other  as  a  church  tower,  which  fell  with  that  fury, 
that  the  rebound  of  waters  made  it  seem  as  if  it  had  been  covered  all  ovor 
with  a  great  shower  of  rain  ;  and  in  some  places  we  took  it  at  the  first  for  a 
smoke  that  had  risen  over  some  great  town." 

The  '  History  of  the  World  '  is  a  work  of  erudition  rather  than 
a  narrative — going  off  into  general  dissertations  on  the  origin  of 
government,  the  nature,  use,  and  abuse  of  magic,  &c. ;  comparing 
the  personages  of  Scripture  with  the  personages  of  heathen  myth- 
ology ;  discussing  at  great  length  such  vexed  questions  as  the  site 
of  Paradise,  the  place  where  the  ark  rested,  the  local  dispersion 
of  the  sons  of  Noah,  &c. ;  and  in  tlie  classical  history  criticising 
accounts  of  battles  and  campaigns  with  the  sagacity  of  a  practical 
man.  The  only  parts  of  the  book  that  any  modern  reader  would 
care  to  peruse  are  some  parts  of  the  Greek,  Macedonian,  and  Roman 
history — where  his  estimates  of  events  in  war  and  in  policy  are 
entitled  to  respect ; — the  preface  to  the  work  ;  and  the  conclusion. 
Only  the  preface  and  the  conclusion  have  much  literary  value ; 
they  are  among  the  finest  remains  of  Elizabethan  prose.  Critics 
often  incautiously  speak  as  if  the  whole  work  were  written  in  the 
same  strain.  A  grave  melancholy  runs  through  them,  the  natural 
mood  of  an  ambitious  spirit  and  a  strong  confident  wit  chastened 
but  not  broken  by  slander  and  imprisonment,  writing  in  "  the 
evening  of  a  tempestuous  life."  Especially  remarkable  are  the 
passages  on  Death.  In  the  preface  he  says  : — 

"  But  let  every  man  value  his  own  wisdom,  as  he  pleaseth.  Let  the  rich 
man  think  all  fools,  that  cannot  equal  his  abundance  ;  the  Revenger  esteem 
all  negligent  that  have  not  trodden  down  their  opposites  ;  the  Politician,  all 
gross  that  cannot  merchandise  their  faith  :  Yet  when  we  once  come  in  sight 
of  the  Port  of  death,  to  which  all  winds  drive  us,  and  when  by  letting  fall 
that  fatal  Anchor,  which  can  never  be  weighed  again,  the  navigation  of  this 
life  takes  end :  Then  it  is,  I  say,  that  our  own  cogitations  (those  sad  and 
severe  cogitations,  formerly  beaten  from  us  by  our  health  and  felicity)  re- 
turn again,  and  pay  us  to  the  uttermost  for  all  the  pleasing  passages  of  our 
life  past." 

In  the  same  strain  he  concludes  his  history  : — 

"  It  is  therefore  death  alone  that  can  suddenly  make  man  to  know  him- 
self. He  tells  the  proud  and  insolent  that  they  are  but  Abjects,  and  humbles 
them  at  the  instant ;  makes  them  cry,  complain,  and  repent ;  yea,  even  to 
hate  their  forepassed  happiness.  He  takes  the  account  of  the  rich,  and 
proves  him  a  beggar  ;  a  naked  beggar,  which  hath  interest  in  nothing,  but 
in  the  gravel  that  fills  his  month.  He  holds  a  Glass  before  the  eyes  of  the 
most  beautiful,  and  makes  them  see  therein  their  deformity  and  rottenness  ; 
and  they  acknowledge  it. 

"  O  eloquent,  just,  and  mighty  Death  !  whom  none  could  advise,  thou 
hast  persuaded  ;  what  none  hath  dared,  thou  hast  done  ;  and  whom  all  the 
world  hath  flattered,  thou  only  hast  cast  out  of  the  world  and  despised ; 
thou  hast  drawn  together  all  the  tar-stretched  greatness,  all  the  pride, 
cruelty,  and  ambition  of  man,  and  covered  it  all  over  with  these  two 
narrow  words,  Hie  jacet." 


238  FROM   1580  TO   1610. 

Raleigh's  other  works  are  a  treatise  on  Ship-building,  '  Maxims 
of  State,'  the  '  Cabinet  Council,'  the  'Sceptic,'  and  '  Advice  to  his 
Son.'  In  worlHly  wisdom,  this  last  is  equal  to  Bacon's  Essays, 
though  the  subjects  of  advice  are  more  commonplace. 

William  Cecil,  Lord  Burleigh  (1522-1598),  like  Raleigh,  wrote 
advice  for  his  son  under  the  title  '  Precepts  or  Directions  for  the 
Well-ordering  and  Carriage  of  a  Man's  Life,'  a  digest  of  common- 
place advice  on  the  choice  of  a  wife,  the  management  of  a  house- 
hold, the  danger  of  suretiship,  and  suchlike. 

Thomas  Dekker,  the  dramatist,  an  antagonist  of  Ben  Jonson's, 
wrote  '  Seven  Deadly  Sins  of  London '  (1606),  '  The  Gull's  Horn- 
book '  (1609),  and  other  ephemeral  productions — burlesque  satires 
of  the  extreme  fashionable  world,  of  the  bucks  and  girls  of  the 
period. 

King  James  I.  had  a  literary  turn  :  he  wrote  '  A  Counterblast 
to  Tobacco,'  and  a  work  on  '  Demonology.'  Neither  of  these 
pedantic  compositions  would  have  survived  had  they  been  written 
by  a  less  distinguished  personage. 

The  unfortunate  Sir  Thomas  Overbury  (1581-1613), — who,  after 
figuring  brilliantly  at  the  Court  of  James  as  the  favourite  of  the 
King's  favourite,  Robert  Carr,  was  mysteriously  cut  off  by  slow 
poison,  in  consequence  of  his  opposing  Carr's  marriage  with  the 
Countess  of  Essex, — wrote  '  Characters  of  Witty  Descriptions  of 
the  Properties  of  Sundry  Persons.'  Fanciful  word-play,  we  have 
seen,  existed  at  Court  before  Lyly's  '  Euphuism  ' :  the  sermons  of 
the  King's  admired  preachers  are  one  evidence  that  it  continued 
when  the  temporary  fashion  of  Euphuism  was  gone ;  Overbury's 
characters  are  another  and  a  stronger.  Take  as  a  sample  his  de- 
scription of  a  tinker : — 

"  He  seems  to  be  very  devout,  for  his  life  is  a  continual  pilgrimage  ;  and 
sometimes  in  humility  goes  barefoot,  therein  making  necessity  a  virtue.  His 
house  is  as  ancient  as  Tubal-Cain's,  and  so  is  a  renegade  by  antiquity  ;  yet 
he  proves  himself  a  gallant,  for  he  carries  all  his  wealth  upon  his  back  ;  or 
a  philosopher,  tor  he  hears  all  his  substance  about  him.  .  .  .  So  marches 
he  all  over  England  with  his  bag  and  baggage;  his  conversation  is  irreprov- 
able,  tor  he  is  ever  mending.  He  observes  truly  the  statutes,  and  therefore 
had  rather  steal  than  beg,  in  which  he  is  irremovably  constant,  in  spite  of 
whips  or  imprisonment.  .  .  .  Some  would  take  him  to  be  a  coward, 
but,  believe  it,  he  is  a  lad  of  mettle.  .  .  .  He  is  very  provident,  for  he 
will  fight  with  but  one  at  once,  and  then  also  he  had  rather  submit  than  be 
counted  obstinate." 


CHAPTER    IIL 


FROM    l6lO   TO    16401. 


PKANCIS     BACOTT. 

1561 — 1626. 

WERE  we  to  place  authors  strictly  according  to  age,  we  should 
include  Bacon  in  the  same  generation  with  Sidney  and  Hooker. 
But  we  have  an  eye  rather  to  the  dates  of  the  composition  of  their 
works;  and  most  of  Bacon's  works  were  written  after  1610. 

As  the  "  founder  of  Inductive  Philosophy,"  his  great  reputation 
is  literary  rather  than  scientific ;  he  advanced  Science  as  an  advo- 
cate, not  as  a  labourer  in  the  field.  He  recalled  men  from  specu- 
lation, and  urged  them  to  study  facts.  He  was  an  eager  and  acute 
observer,  whenever  he  found  time ;  but  only  a  fraction  of  his  time 
was  devoted  to  Science.  His  service  lay  not  so  much  in  what  he 
did  himself,  as  in  the  grand  impulse  he  gave  to  others. 

The  merits  of  his  style,  as  of  every  other  style  in  that  age,  are 
variously  estimated.  Addison  praises  his  grace,  Hume  calls  him 
stiff  and  rigid,  and  many  persons  would  be  unable  to  see  that 
either  of  these  criticisms  has  any  peculiar  application.  But  all 
admit  that  he  is  one  of  the  greatest  writers  of  prose  during  the 
reigns  of  Elizabeth  and  James. 

His  father,  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon,  was  Elizabeth's  Lord  Keeper ; 
his  mother,  Anne  Cooke,  a  woman  of  Lady  Jane  Grey  accomplish- 
ments, translated  Bishop  Jewel's  'Apology '  in  1564.  Born  at  his 
father's  house  in  London,  Francis  was  sent  at  the  age  of  twelve  to 
Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  and  remained  there  for  two  years  and 
a  half  under  the  care  of  Whitgift,  then  Master  of  Trinity.  Of 
these  early  days  little  is  known,  except  that  he  was  an  exceed- 
ingly grave  and  precocious  child,  and  was  called  by  Elizabeth  her 


240  FROM  1610  TO  1640. 

"  young  Lord  Keeper  " ;  it  is  said,  also,  that  before  he  left  Cam- 
bridge he  had  begun  to  dislike  Aristotle  as  being  barren  of  prac- 
tical fruit.  Previous  to  his  father's  death  in  1579,  he  had  spent 
more  than  two  years  in  laris  with  the  English  ambassador  there. 
His  ideal  at  this  time  seems  to  have  been  to  make  statecraft  his 
profession,  and  reserve  a  considerable  part  of  his  time  for  study. 
But  his  father's  death  leaving  him  without  adequate  provision, 
and  his  uncle  Burleigh  refusing  to  find  him  a  sinecure,  he  was 
compelled  to  take  up  the  profession  of  law.  He  was  admitted  as 
an  utter  barrister  in  1582  ;  and  thenceforth  his  time  was  distril>- 
uted  between  the  practice  of  law,  public  business,  and  his  great 
literary  projects.  Under  Elizabeth  his  promotion  was  not  rapid  : 
the  Queen  thought  him  "  showy  and  not  deep  "  in  law ;  he  had 
enemies  at  Court  in  his  uncle  and  cousin ;  and  his  generous  patron, 
Essex,  did  him  more  harm  than  good  by  indiscreet  urgency.  He 
got  nothing  but  the  reversion  of  the  Clerkship  of  the  Star-Chamber, 
which  did  not  fall  in  for  twenty  years ;  he  applied  in  vain  for  the 
Attorney-Generalship,  the  Solicitor-Generalship,  and  the  Master- 
ship of  the  Rolls.  Under  James,  he  became  Solicitor-General  in 
1607,  Attorney-General  in  1613,  Lord  Chancellor  in  1617.  In 
1620  appeared  the  '  Novum  Organum.'  In  1621  he  underwent 
the  well-known  censure  of  Parliament,  being  fined  and  deprived  of 
the  Great  Seal.  The  remainder  of  his  life  was  passed  in  studious 
retirement,  during  which  he  composed  the  greater  part  of  his 
literary  works.  In  the  spring  of  1626  he  caught  a  chill  when 
experimenting  with  snow,  and  died  on  Easter-day,  April  9. 

His  chief  English  works  are  the  '  Essays,'  the  '  Advancement  of 
Learning,'  the  'History  of  Henry  VIL,'  the  'New  Atlantis,'  and 
'  Sylva  Sylvarum.'  Of  the  Essays  there  were  three  different  issues : 
ten  essays  in  15  97,  under  the  title  'Essays,  Religious  Meditations, 
Places  of  persuasion  and  dissuasion  ;'  thirty-eight  in  1612,  entitled 
'  The  Essays  of  Sir  Francis  Bacon,  Knight,  the  King's  Solicitor- 
General;'  fifty-eight  in  1625,  entitled  'The  Essays  or  Counsels, 
Civil  and  Moral,  of,'  &<x  The  '  Advancement  of  Learning '  (which 
he  translated  into  Latin,  and  enlarged  during  his  retirement,  call- 
ing it  'De  Augmentis  Scientiarum')  was  published  in  1605.  The 
'  History  of  Henry  VII.'  was  his  first  work  after  he  was  banished 
from  Court.  The  'New  Atlantis'  was  written  about  the  same 
time ;  it  is  a  romance  somewhat  after  the  manner  of  More's 
'  Utopia,'  the  design  being  to  describe  a  college  fully  equipped  for 
the  study  of  Nature  on  the  inductive  method  '  Sylva  Sylvarum ' 
or  the  '  Natural  History,' — a  collection  of  facts  touching  the 
qualities  of  bodies,  made  partly  from  observation,  partly  from 
books — was  the  last  work  of  his  life. 

Bacon  seems  to  have  been  in  person   a   little,  broad,  square- 


FRANCIS   BACON.  241 

shouldered,  brown  man,  thin   and   nervous-looking.      He   had  a 
large  head  and  small  features. 

It  would  be  presumptuous  to  attempt  anything  like  an  exact 
valuation  of  Bacon's  intellectual  power.  We  state  only  what  lie>. 
upon  the  surface  when  we  say  that  the  character  &nd  products  ol 
his  intellect  are  very  often  as  much  over-estimated  upon  one  side 
as  they  are  under-estimated  upon  another.  He  is  frequently  praised 
as  if  he  had  originated  and  established  the  inductive  method,  as  if 
he  had  laid  down  the  canons  appealed  to  in  modern  science  as  tho 
ultimate  conditions  of  sound  induction.  This  is  going  too  far. 
Bacon  was  an  orator,  not  a  worker ;  a  Tyrtaeus,  not  a  Miltiades. 
He  rendered  a  great  service  by  urging  recourse  to  observation  and 
experiment  rather  than  to  speculation  ;  but  neither  by  precept  nor 
by  example  did  he  show  koto  to  observe  and  experiment  well,  or 
so  as  to  arrive  at  substantial  conclusions.  Not  by  precept  •  for  if 
modern  inductive  method  were  no  better  than  Bacon's  inductive 
method,  Macaulay's  caricature  of  the  process  would  not  be  so  very 
unlike  the  reality.  Nor  by  example  ;  for  the  majority  of  his  own 
generalisations  are  loose  to  a  degree.  To  call  Bacon  the  founder  of 
scientific  method  is  to  mistake  the  character  of  his  mind,  and  to 
do  him  an  injustice  by  resting  his  fame  upon  a  false  foundation. 
Unwearied  activity,  inexhaustible  constructiveness — that,  and  not 
scientific  patience  or  accuracy,  was  his  characteristic.  He  had 
what  Peter  Heylin  calls  "  a  chymical  brain  " ;  every  group  of  facts 
that  entered  his  inind  he  restlessly  threw  into  new  combinations. 
We  over-estimate  the  man  upon  one  side  when  we  give  him  credit 
for  scientific  rigour ;  his  contemporary  Gilbert,  who  wrote  upon 
the  magnet,  probably  had  more  scientific  caution  and  accuracy 
than  he.  And  we  under-estimate  him  upon  another  side  when  we 
speak  as  if  the  Inductive  Philosophy  had  been  the  only  outcome  of 
his  ever-active  brain.  His  projects  of  reform  in  Law  were  almost 
as  vast  as  his  projects  of  reform  in  Philosophy.  In  Politics  he 
drew  up  opinions  on  every  question  of  importance  during  the 
forty  years  of  his  public  life,  and  was  often  employed  by  the 
Queen  and  Lord  Burleigh  to  write  papers  of  State.  All  this  was 
done  in  addition  to  his  practical  work  as  a  lawyer.  And  yet  hia 
multiplex  labours  do  not  seem  to  have  used  up  his  mental  vigour ; 
his  schemes  always  outran  human  powers  of  performance.  His 
ambition  was  not  to  make  one  great  finished  effort  and  then  rest ; 
his  intellectual  appetite  seemed  almost  insatiable.1 

1  It  is  a  curious  problem  to  make  out  why  an  intellect  so  acute  and  active 
revolted  from  the  subtleties  of  the  schoolmen,  and  did  not  rather  turn  to  them 
as  its  most  congenial  element.  Part  of  the  explanation  i's  doubtless  to  be  found 
in  the  high  development  of  his  senses,  in  the  strong  arrest  of  his  mind  upon  the 
outer  world.  A  meditative  man  will  walk  for  miles  through  the  country,  and 
be  unable  to  describe  minutely  any  one  object  tLat  he  has  seen.  Bacon's  ey« 


242  FROM  1610  TO   1640. 

In  a  man  with  such  prodigious  activity  of  intellect,  and  such  a 
bent  towards  analysing  and  classifying  dry  facts,  we  do  not  look 
for  much  warmth  of  feeling.  He  is  not  likely  to  spend  much  of 
his  time  either  in  imagining  objects  of  tender  affection  or  in  doting 
upon  actual  objects.  The  world  has  not  yet  seen  the  intellect  of  a 
Bacon  combined  with  the  sentimentality  of  a  Sterne,  or  the  phil- 
anthropy of  a  Howard.  The  works  of  Bacon  afford  very  little  food 
for  ordinary  human  feelings.  All  the  pleasure  we  gain  from  them 
is  founded  upon  their  intellectual  excellences.  Even  the  similitudes 
are  intellectual  rather  than  emotional,  ingenious  rather  than  touch- 
ing or  poetical.  To  adapt  an  image  of  Ben  Jonson's — the  wine  of 
Bacon's  writings  is  a  dry  wine.  As  we  read,  we  experience  the 
pleasure  of  surmounting  obstacles  ;  we  are  electrified  by  unexpected 
analogies,  and  the  sudden  revelations  of  new  aspects  in  familiar 
things  ;  and  we  sympathise  more  or  less  with  the  boundless  ex- 
hilaration of  a  mind  that  pierces  with  ease  and  swiftness  through 
barriers  that  reduce  other  minds  to  torpor  and  stagnancy. 

Our  author  says  of  himself  that  he  was  not  born  "  under  Jupiter 
that  loveth  business  "  ;  "  the  contemplative  planet  carried  him 
away  solely."  He  had  not  the  physical  constitution  needed  to 
bear  the  worry  and  fatigue  of  the  actual  direction  of  affairs — not 
to  say  that  he  was  so  engrossed  with  his  intellectual  projects  that 
practical  drudgery  was  intolerably  irksome.  As  Lord  Chancellor, 
he  cleared  off  a  large  accumulation  of  unheard  cases  with  great 
despatch  ;  but  he  proved  unequal  to  the  minuter  duties  of  the 
office,  and  allowed  subordinates  to  do  as  they  pleased.1 

Opinions. — The  following  is  a  bare  outline  of  Bacon's  great 
philosophical  project  :  "  The  '  Instau ratio  '  is  to  be  divided  into 

probably  drank  in  everything  as  he  went  along ;  or,  if  not  everything,  at  least 
enough  to  keep  him  thinking  about  external  things. 

1  So  much  has  been  made  *  certain  specific  charges  of  moral  delinquency  on 
the  part  of  Bacon,  that  we  cannot  pass  them  over  without  some  notice.  Atten- 
tive readers  will  have  anticipated  our  explanation.  Take  the  case  of  Essex. 
Essex  warmly  patronised  Bacon,  pleaded  with  the  Queen  for  his  preferment,  and 
made  him  a  present  of  an  estate.  Yet  when  Essex  was  charged  with  treasonable 
practices,  Bacon,  as  one  of  the  Queen's  Counsel,  took  part  in  the  impeachment. 
We  cannot  enter  here  into  minute  casuistry  ;  but  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  im- 
pulsive Essex  forced  his  patronage  and  his  favours  upon  Bacon,  and  that  Bacon, 
while  he  feared  to  discourage  such  a  man's  friendship,  was  acutely  aware  of  its 
inconveniences.  A  man  of  high  honour  would  have  firmly  declined  Essex's 
services  ;  a  generous  man,  who  had  accepted  such  services,  would  have  felt 
bound  to  stand  by  Essex  to  the  last ;  and  yet  it  would  have  been  imprudent  to 
have  acted  otherwise  than  as  Bacon  acted.  His  conduct  in  the  Chancellorship  is 
a  plainer  case.  The  faults  that  have  been  proved  against  him  were  faults  of 
omission,  not  of  commission.  He  was  engrossed  with  his  '  Novum  Organum '  and 
other  projects,  and  closed  his  eyes  to  the  doings  of  subordinates.  He  may  even 
have  received  bribe-money  from  them  without  being  at  pains  to  inquire  into  the 
particulars.  We  can  quite  believe  his  declaration  that  he  never  gave  judgment 
"  with  a  bribe  in  his  eye."  He  broke  faith,  uot  with  justice,  but  with  the  givet 
ol  the  bribe. 


FRANCIS  BACON.  243 

six  portions,  of  which  the  first  is  to  contain  a  general  survey  of 
the  present  state  of  knowledge.  In  the  second,  men  are  to  be 
taught  how  to  use  their  understanding  aright  in  the  investigation 
of  nature.  In  the  third,  all  the  phenomena  of  the  universe  are  to 
be  stored  up  as  in  a  treasure-house,  as  the  materials  on  which  the 
new  method  is  to  be  employed,  in  the  fourth,  examples  are  to  be 
given  of  its  operation  and  of  the  results  to  which  it  leads.  The 
fifth  is  to  contain  what  Bacon  had  accomplished  in  natural  philo- 
sophy without  the  aid  of  his  own  method,  but  merely  "  by  what 
may  be  called  common  reason.  In  the  sixth  part  "  will  be  set 
forth  the  new  philosophy — the  result  of  the  application  of  the  new 
method  to  all  the  phenomena  of  the  universe." 

No  sketch  can  here  be  attempted  of  his  methods  of  induction. 
They  possess  little  or  no  scientific  value.  He  had  no  conception 
of  valid  proof.  His  own  speculations  are  as  rash  as  anything  to 
be  found  in  the  schoolmen.  Thus,  among  his  '  Prerogative  In- 
stances '  he  lays  down  that  precious  stones,  diamonds  and  rubies, 
are  fine  exudations  of  stone,  just  as  the  gum  of  trees  is  a  fine 
straining  through  the  wood  and  bark.  He  repeats  this  theory 
in  the  '  Sylva  Sylvarum.'  Of  the  thousand  paragraphs  in  the 
'  Sylva '  touching  natural  phenomena  and  their  causes,  there  is 
hardly  one  that  does  not  contain  some  speculation  equally  fanciful. 

The  opinions  contained  in  his  Essays  1— observations  and  pre- 
cepts on  man  and  society — are  perhaps  the  most  permanent  evi- 
dence of  his  sagacity.  In  this  field  he  was  thoroughly  at  home ; 
the  study  of  mankind  occupied  the  largest  part  of  his  time.  The 
Essays  treat  of  a  great  variety  of  subjects — Truth,  Death,  Dis- 
simulation, Superstition,  Plantations,  Masks  and  Triumphs,  Beauty, 
Deformity,  Vicissitudes  of  Things.  To  give  any  general  idea  of 
the  contents  of  so  many  closely-packed  pages  of  solid  observation, 
is  impossible  within  our  limits.  It  may  be  said  that  to  men  wish- 
ing to  rise  in  the  world  by  politic  management  of  their  fellow- 
men,  Bacon's  Essays  are  the  best  handbook  hitherto  published. 
His  own  worldly  wisdom  was  clenched  by  the  significant  aphorism, 
"  By  indignities  men  come  to  dignities." 

His  opinions  in  religion  have  been  disputed.  We  know  that 
his  mother  considered  him  remiss  in  the  matter  of  family  prayers, 
and  in  this  respect  not  a  pattern  to  his  elder  brother.  But  there 
is  nothing  in  his  writings  at  variance  with  the  orthodox  faith.  It 
has  been  doubted  whether  a  work  called  '  The  Christian  Para- 
doxes '  was  written  by  him  ;  but  if  it  was,  it  is  only  what  it  pro- 
fesses to  be — a  paradoxical  expression  of  orthodoxy.  He  did  not, 
as  is  sometimes  stated,  deny  the  argument  from  final  causes.  He 

1  The  second  part  of  the  title — "Counsels  Civil  and  Moral"  is  much  more 
descriptive  of  the  book,  but  it  has  been  dropped,  anil  would  be  difficult  to  re- 
vive. The  original  ten  essays  con  tallied  almost  nothing  but  maxims  of  prudence. 


244  FROM  1610  TO   1640. 

only  maintained  that  looking  for  final  causes  is  a  distraction  from 
the  invesdgation  of  physical  causes.  He  would  seem  to  have  held 
that  theology  can  be  founded  only  on  the  Bible,  and  that  whatever 
is  affirmed  there  must  be  believed  implicitly. 


ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — Bacon's  range  of  subjects  was  wide,  and  his  com- 
mand of  words  within  that  range  as  great  as  any  man  could  have 
acquired.  He  took  pains  to  keep  his  vocabulary  rich.  From 
some  private  notes  that  have  been  preserved,  we  see  that  he  had  a 
habit  of  jotting  down  and  refreshing  his  memory  with  varieties  of 
expression  on  all  subjects  that  were  likely  to  occur  for  discussion. 

He  uses  a  great  many  more  obsolete  words  than  either  Hooker 
or  Sidney.  To  be  sure,  the  language  of  the  feelings  and  the 
language  of  theology  have  changed  less  than  the  language  of 
science.  But  in  his  narrative  and  in  his  Essays,  as  well  as  in 
his  scientific  writings,  Bacon  shows  a  decided  preference  now 
and  then  for  "  inkhorn  terms."  In  his  '  History  of  King  Henry 
VII.'  we  meet  with  such  words  as  "  habilitate "  for  qualified, 
"the  brocage  of  an  usurper"  for  the  baits  or  panderings  of  an 
usurper,  "  impatronise  himself  of  "  for  make  himself  patron  of, 
"difficile  to"  for  slow  to  or  unwilling  to, — and  suchlike.  How 
archaic  the  scientific  style  is  may  be  seen  in  the  following  pas- 
sage from  the  '  Sylva  Sylvarum  ' — perhaps  an  extreme  case. 
It  is  headed,  "Experiment  Solitary  touching  Change  of  Aliments 
and  Medicines  : " — 

"  It  helpeth  both  in  medicine  and  aliment,  to  change  and  not  to  continue 
the  same  medicine  and  aliment  still.  The  cause  is,  for  that  nature,  by 
continual  use  of  anything,  groweth  to  a  satiety  and  dullness,  either  of 
appetite  or  working.  And  we  see  that  as.suetude  of  things  hurtful  doth 
make  them  lose  their  force  to  hurt ;  as  poison  which  with  use  some  have 
brought  themselves  to  brook.  And  therefore  it  is  no  marvel  though  things 
helpful,  by  custom,  lose  their  force  to  help.  I  count  intermission  almost 
the  same  thing  with  change  ;  for  that  that  hath  been  intermitted  is  after  a 
sort  new." 

The  phrase  "  for  that "  in  place  of  inasmuch  as  is  used  so  often 
by  Bacon  as  almost  to  be  a  mannerism.  The  frequent  use  corre- 
sponds to  his  habit  of  accounting  for  things. 

Sentences. — His  general  structure  of  sentence,  as  shown  in  his 
'Advancement  of  Learning,'  his  History,  and  his  occasional  dis- 
courses, is  less  elaborate  but  more  modern  than  in  Hooker's 
average  style.  His  sentences  are  shorter  and  more  pointed ;  and 
being  comparatively  free  from  pedantic  inversions,  have  a  more 
modern  flow.  In  the  placing  of  qualifying  clauses  he  is  less 
awkward.  The  following  period,  from  his  "  Discourse  in  praise  of 


FRANCIS  BACON.  245 

Elizabeth,"  if  somewhat  intricate,  is  well  built,  and  graduated  to 
a  climax : — 

"The  benefits  of  Almighty  God  upon  this  land,  since  the  time  that  in 
His  singular  providence  He  led  as  it  were  by  the  hand,  and  placed  in  the 
kingdom,  His  servant,  our  Queen  Elizabeth,  are  such,  as  not  in  boast- 
ing or  in  confidence  of  ourselves,  but  in  praise  of  His-  holy  name,  are 
worthy  to  be  both  considered  and  confessed,  yea,  and  registered  in  perpetual 
memory. " 

The  next,  from  the  '  Advancement  of  Learning,'  is  an  average 
specimen  of  his  long  sentence : — 

"  And  for  matter  of  policy  and  government,  that  learning  should  rather 
hurt  than  enable  thereunto,  is  a  thing  very  improbable  :  we  see  it  is  ac- 
counted an  error  to  commit  a  natural  body  to  empiric  physicians,  which 
commonly  have  a  few  pleasing  receipts  whereupon  they  are  confident  and 
adventurous,  but  know  neither  the  causes  of  diseases,  nor  the  complexions 
of  patients,  nor  peril  of  accidents,  nor  the  true  method  of  cures  :  we  see  it 
is  a  like  error  to  rely  upon  advocates  or  lawyers,  which  are  only  men  of 
practice  and  not  grounded  in  their  books,  who  are  many  times  easily  sur- 
prised when  matter  falleth  out  besides  their  experience,  to  the  prejudice  of 
the  causes  they  handle  :  so  by  like  reason  it  cannot  be  but  a  matter  of  doubt- 
ful consequence  if  states  be  managed  by  empiric  statesmen,  not  well  mingled 
with  men  grounded  in  learning." 

The  Essays,  particularly  the  earlier  ones,  are  full  of  balance  and 
point,  suiting  their  character  as  emphatic  aphoristic  precepts.  The 
Essay  on  Studies,  the  first  of  the  original  ten,  is  more  than  usually 
balanced : — 

"  Bead  not  to  contradict  and  confute ;  nor  to  believe  and  take  for  granted ; 
nor  to  find  talk  and  discourse  ;  but  to  weigh  and  consider.  Some  books  are 
to  be  tasted,  others  to  be  swallowed,  and  some  few  to  be  chewed  and 
digested  ;  that  is,  some  books  are  to  be  read  only  in  parts ;  others  to  be 
read,  but  not  curiously;  and  some  few  to  be  read  wholly,  and  with  dili- 
gence and  attention.  .  .  .  Reading  maketh  a  full  man ;  conference  a 
ready  man ;  and  writing  an  exact  man.  And  therefore,  if  a  man  write 
little,  he  had  need  have  a  .great  memory ;  if  he  confer  little,  he  had  need 
have  a  present  wit ;  and  if  he  read  little,  he  had  need  have  much  cunning, 
to  seem  to  know  that  he  doth  not.  Histories  make  men  wise  ;  poets  witty  ; 
the  mathematics  subtile  ;  natural  philosophy  deep ;  moral  grave  ;  logic  and 
rhetoric  able  to  contend." 

The  following  is  from  his  sagacious  Essay  "Of  Negotiat- 
ing":— 

"It  is  generally  better  to  deal  by  speech  than  by  letter.  Letters  are 
good,  when  a  man  would  draw  an  answer  by  letter  back  again  ;  or  when  it 
may  serve  for  a  man's  justification  afterwards  to  produce  his  own  letter ;  or 
where  it  may  be  danger  to  be  interrupted  or  heard  by  pieces.  To  deal  in 
person  is  good,  when  a  man's  face  breed eth  regard,  as  commonly  with  in- 
feriors ;  or  in  tender  cases,  where  a  man's  eye  upon  the  countenance  of  him 
with  whom  he  speaketh  may  give  him  a  direction  hew  far  to  go  ;  and  gen- 
erally, when  a  man  will  reserve  to  himself  liberty  either  to  disavow  or  to 
expound." 


246  FEOM   1610  TO   1640. 

Again — 

"  All  practice  is  to  discover  or  to  work.  Men  discover  themselves  in 
trust,  in  passion,  at  unawares,  and  of  necessity,  when  they  would  have 
somewhat  done  and  cannot  tind  an  apt  pretext.  If  you  would  work  any 
man,  you  must  either  know  Ids  nature  and  fashions,  and  so  lead  him ;  or 
his  ends,  and  so  'persuade  him  ;  or  his  weakness  and  disadvantages,  and  so 
awe  him  ;  or  those  that  have  interest  in  him,  and  so  govern  him." 

Paragraphs. — In  connection  with  the  paragraph  may  be  noticed 
a  peculiarity  in  the  composition  of  the  Essays.  As  a  rule,  Bacon's 
paragraphs  are,  comparatively,  very  good ;  he  has  a  sense  of 
method  and  good  arrangement  In  the  '  Advancement  of  Learn- 
ing '  he  adheres  to  a  simple  scheme  ;  and  the  sentences  of  separate 
paragraphs  are  not  inconsecutive  nor  complicated,  as  Hooker's 
sometimes  are.  But  the  Essays  are  of  a  peculiar  structure. 
They  are  not,  nor  are  they  intended  to  be,  consecutive  exposi- 
tions ;  each  is  a  string  of  detached  reflections  and  maxims  bear- 
ing upon  the  same  subject.  The  author's  intention  is  more 
apparent  in  his  first  edition  ;  he  there  distinguishes  the  transitions 
by  the  obsolete  mark  IT.  Thus,  in  the  passage  quoted  from  the 
Essay  on  Studies,  there  are  four  such  marks,  one  at  the  head  of 
each  of  the  four  different  tacks — showing  that  he  changed  his  tack 
advisedly,  and  not  from  confusion. 

Figures  of  Speech — Similitudes. — Bacon's  pages  are  very  thickly 
strewn  with  similitudes.  The  first  edition  of  the  Essays  is  less 
figurative  than  the  latest  edition  ;  the  enlargements  of  the  original 
ten  often  consist  of  additional  figures. 

That  his  earlier  writings  should  be  less  figurative,  accords  with 
the  character  of  his  figures.  They  are  not  elaborated  like  the 
figures  of  Jeremy  Taylor  or  Curly le :  his  first  care  was  the  plain 
expression  of  his  meaning ;  he  made  little  effort  to  obtain  simili- 
tudes, but  took  them  rather  when  they  came  of  themselves.  He 
is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  an  imaginative  writer;  but  this  is  not 
accurate  if  imagination  is  held  to  imply  poetical  feeling :  his 
imagery  is  not  evoked  to  gratify  any  poetical  feeling  refined  or 
unrefined,  but  partly  for  purposes  of  illustration,  and  partly  in  the 
exercise  of  his  incontinent  quickness  to  discover  analogy.  This 
appears  the  moment  we  look  at  any  number  of  his  similitudes 
together.  They  are  taken  almost  exclusively  from  familiar  objects 
and  operations  in  nature  and  human  life.  In  his  narrative  their 
number  is  more  within  bounds,  and  they  are  usually  very  graphic; 
in  the  Essays  they  are  often  superfluous. 

We  shall  exemplify  his  similitudes  at  some  length,  as  the  best 
way  of  showing  that  they  are  taken  from  familiar  things,  and  that 
they  are  more  illustrative  than  poetical : — 

"For  Pope  Alexander,  finding  himself  pent  and  locked  up  by  a  league 
Mid  association  of  the  principal  States  of  Italy,  that  he  could  not  make  his 


FRANCIS   BACON.  247 

way  for  the  advancement  of  his  own  house  (which  he  immoderately  thirsted 
after),  was  desirous  to  trouble  the  waters  in  Italy,  that  he  might  fish  the 
better. " 

When  Henry  was  threatened  with  a  Scotch  war,  a  Cornish 
insurrection,  and  the  pretender  Perkin  Warbeck  all  at  once,  he 
judged  it — 

"His  hest  and  surest  way  to  keep  his  strength  together  in  the  seat  and 
centre  of  his  kingdom  ;  according  to  the  ancient  Indian  emblem — in  such  a 
swelling  season,  to  hold  his  hand  upon  the  middle  of  the  bladder  tliut  no  side 
might  rise." 

After  recounting  Henry's  fine  calculations  regarding  the  action 
of  Continental  powers,  he  says  : — 

"  But  those  things  were  too  fine  to  be  fortunate  and  succeed  in  all  parts  ; 
for  that  great  affairs  are  commonly  too  rough  and  stubborn  to  be  wrought  upon 
by  the  finer  edges  or  points  of  wit. " 

The  following  is  the  opening  sentence  of  the  fragment  on  Henry 

"After  the  decease  of  that  wise  and  fortunate  king,  King  Henry  the 
Seventh,  who  died  in  the  height  of  his  prosperity,  there  followed  (as  nsetb. 
to  do  when  the  sun  setteth  so  exceeding  clear)  oue  of  the  fairest  mornings  of 
a  kingdom  that  hath  been  known  in  this  land  or  anywhere  else. " 

He  very  often  uses  these  metaphors  taken  from  the  phenomena 
of  the  weather.  At  the  outset  of  his  reign,  Henry,  in  liis  account 
of  peace  and  calms,  "  did  much  overcast  his  fortunes,  which  proved 
for  many  years  together  full  of  broken  seas,  tides,  and  tempests." 
When  the  King  has  passed  through  any  of  his  troubles,  it  is  "  fair 
weather"  again.  The  news  of  Perkin  Warbeck's  claims  "comes 
thundering  and  blazing"  from  abroad.  So  in  the  Essay  on 
Seditions  he  says  that  "  as  there  are  certain  hollow  blasts  of 
wind,  and  secret  swellings  of  seas  before  tempests,  so  are  there 
in  States."  Perhaps  his  most  favourite  figures  are  those  taken 
from  medicine  and  surgery :  he  is  fond  of  likening  individuals 
and  societies  to  a  body,  and  supposing  them  subject  to  disease, 
or  operated  on  by  a  physician  or  surgeon.  Thus — 

"  The  King  of  Scotland  laboured  under  the  same  disease  that  King  Henry 
did  (though  more  mortal,  as  it  afterwards  appeared),  that  is,  discontented 
subjects,  apt  to  rise  and  raise  tumult." 

So  with  King  Henry,  insurrection  was  "  almost  a  fever  that  took 
him  every  year."  In  his  punishment  of  treason,  Henry  "com- 
monly drew  blood  (as  physicians  do),  rather  to  save  life  than  to 
spill  it"  A  good  many  figures  of  this  kind  might  be  picked  from 
the  Essays.  Thus — 

"  It  were  too  long  to  go  over  all  the  particular  remedies  which  learning 
doth  minister  to  all  the  diseases  of  the  mind — sometimes  purging  the  ill 
humours,  sometimes  opening  the  obstructions,  sometimes  helping  the  diges- 


248  FROM   1610  TO   1640. 

tion,  sometimes  increasing  appetite,  sometimes  healing  the  wounds  and 
ulcerations  thereof,  and  the  like." 

Again,  regarding  seditions,  he  says  : — 

"To  give  moderate  liberty  for  griefs  and  discontentments  to  evaporate  (so 
it  be  without  too  great  insolence  or  bravery)  is  a  safe  way.  For  he  that 
turncth  the  humours  back,  and  maketh  the  wound  bleed  inwards,  endan- 
gereth  malign  ulcers  and  pernicious  imposthumations." 

His  well-known  figure  concerning  Truth  has  a  more  poetical  tone 
than  his  figures  usually  have  : — 

"This  same  Truth  is  a  naked  and  open  daylight,  that  doth  not  show  the 
masks  and  mummeries  and  triumphs  of  the  world  half  so  stately  and  daintily 
as  caudle-lights." 

This  was  written  after  his  fall.  It  is  worth  noticing  that,  in  these 
latest  Essays,  both  the  subjects  and  the  illustrations  show  a  grow- 
ing sense  of  the  pleasures  of  retirement. 

Other  figures  than  similitudes  occur  in  Bacon's  writing.  A 
"  corrective  spice  "  of  antithesis  runs  through  all  his  works  ;  some- 
times conducing  to  clearness  and  force,  sometimes  amusing  with 
its  ingenuity.  It  is  illustrated  in  extracts  under  various  heads. 
Of  the  abrupt  figures  he  makes  very  little  use ;  his  style  is  too 
grave  and  sober.  At  the  same  time  he  knows  their  effect  in 
declamation,  and  introduces  them  upon  occasion.  See  an  instance 
at  p.  251. 

QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — The  best  evidence  of  the  general  intelligibility  of 
Bacon's  style  is  that  so  little  has  been  said  about  it.  He  is  neither 
markedly  Latinised  nor  markedly  familiar ;  he  is  perhaps  less 
affected  than  any  of  his  contemporaries.  In  his  '  Advancement  of 
Learning,'  addressed  to  King  James,  he  seems  to  humour  the 
perl  an  try  of  the  monarch,  and  introduces  not  a  few  Latin  quota- 
tions without  translating  them.  In  his  other  works  there  is  less 
of  this ;  there  is  little  obstruction  to  our  getting  at  his  meaning, 
except  an  occasional  technical  term.  And  through  all  his  writings 
the  numerous  homely  and  pointed  illustrations  make  his  meaning 
abundantly  luminous. 

Clearness. — In  perspicuity  of  arrangement,  he  is  much  superior 
to  any  of  the  Elizabethan  writers.  To  quote  the  arrangement  of 
his  '  Novum  Organum '  (see  p.  243)  is  hardly  pertinent,  seeing 
that  it  was  written  in  Latin ;  still,  it  may  be  referred  to  as  an 
example  of  his  orderly  and  simple  method.  The  order  of  topics  in 
the  '  Advancement  of  Learning'  is  also  both  simple  and  free  from 
confusion.  His  classification  of  the  sciences,  though  deficient  as 
a  scientific  classification  for  modern  purposes,  being  superseded  by 


FRANCIS  BACON.  249 

the  vast  enlargement  of  the  subjects  of  human  knowledge  in  re- 
cent times,  is  a  very  lucid  division  so  far  as  it  goes,  and  as  "a 
small  globe  of  the  intellectual  world  "  was  very  serviceable  in  its 
day.  The  divisions  are  so  clear,  and  proceed  upon  distinctions 
so  familiar,  that  though  the  subdivision  is  carried  to  the  eighth 
degree,  there  is  not  the  least  perplexity  to  any  mind  of  ordinary 
education. 

We  cannot  concede  to  him  the  praise  of  scientific  precision ;  in- 
deed he  often  affirms  fundamental  resemblance  where  the  resem- 
blance is  only  slender  and  superficial  Distinctness  in  the  use  of 
words  was  no  part  of  his  scheme  of  philosophical  reformation ;  the 
confusion  of  ambiguous  terms  in  science  could  not  begin  to  be  felt 
until  science  was  more  advanced. 

Still,  in  one  of  the  subjects  that  his  practical  life  brought  him 
to  consider,  we  find  him  aware  of  the  danger  of  loosely  applying 
the  same  term  to  things  not  precisely  alike.  With  reference  to  the 
religious  disputes  of  the  time,  he  objected  to  the  term  priest  for  a 
clergyman ;  minister,  he  said,  or  j/resbyter,  would  be  better,  and 
the  term  priest  should  be  reserved  for  the  sacrificing  priests  under 
the  old  law. 

Apart  from  rigid  exactness,  Bacon  has  in  an  eminent  degree 
what  is  called  incisiveness  of  style ;  his  words  and  figures  go 
straight  to  the  point.  His  remarks  on  Studies  are  a  good  example 
of  making  a  statement  clear  by  giving  counter-statements.  This 
art  of  style  appears  in  all  his  writings.  True,  he  often  uses  the 
"  but "  of  contrast  where  there  is  no  real  opposition,  and  merely 
to  indicate  a  fresh  start :  nevertheless  he  does  make  frequent  and 
effective  use  of  contrast  for  purposes  of  exact  expression.  Thus — 

"  There  followed  this  year,  being  the  second  of  the  King's  reign,  a  strange 
accident  of  state,  whereof  the  relations  which  we  have  are  so  naked,  as  they 
leave  it  scarce  credible  ;  not  for  the  nature  of  it  (for  it  hath  fallen  out  oft), 
but  for  the  manner  and  circumstance  of  it,  especially  in  the  beginnings." 

Here  we  have,  in  a  less  finished  form,  the  scrupulosity  of  qualifi- 
cation that  is  so  marked  a  feature  in  the  style  of  De  Quincey. 
The  following  sentence,  which  is  more  finished,  contains  a  vividly 
incisive  use  of  contrast : — 

"  Neither  was  the  King's  nature  and  customs  greatly  fit  to  disperse  «uch 
mists,  but  contrariwise  he  had  a  fashion  rather  to  create  doubts  than  assur- 
ance. " 

The  passages  italicised  in  the  two  following  contain  ingenious 
distinctions  clearly  expressed  : — 

"  For  the  opinion  of  plenty  is  amongst  the  causes  of  want,  and  the  great 
quantity  of  books  maketh  a  show  rather  of  superfluity  than  lack ;  which 
surcharge  nevertheless  is  not  to  be  remedied  by  making  no  more  books,  but  by 
making  more  good  books,  which,  as  the  serpent  of  Moses,  might  devour  the 
serpents  of  the  enchanters." 


250  FKOM    1610   TO    1640. 

Towards  removing  all  hindrances  to  the  pursuit  of  knowledge,  he 


"The  endeavours  of  a  private  man  may  be  but  as  an  image  in  a  cross- 
way,  that  may  point  at  the  way,  but  cannot  go  it. " 

Strength. — The  quality  of  strength  in  his  style  is  intellectual 
rather  than  emotional.  In  his  narrative  there  is  very  little  expres- 
sion of  feeling  :  the  strength  conies  chiefly  from  conciseness,  secured 
by  comprehensive  statement,  pregnant  metaphor,  and  occasional 
strokes  of  epigrammatic  condensation.  The  following  is  a  lair 
specimen  of  his  way  of  relating  events  ;  in  disentangling  a  variety 
of  motives  or  exhibiting  negotiations,  he  allows  himself  greater 
amplitude : — 

"  At  York  there  came  fresh  and  more  certain  advertisement  that  the  Lord 
Lovell  was  at  hand  with  a  great  power  of  men,  and  that  the  Staffords  were 
in  arms  in  Worcestershire,  and  had  made  their  approaches  to  the  city  of 
Worcester  to  assail  it.  The  King,  as  a  prince  of  great  and  profound  judg- 
ment, was  not  much  moved  with  it,  for  that  he  thought  it  was  but  a  rag  or 
remnant  of  Bosworth  Field,  and  had  nothing  in  it  of  the  main  party  of  the 
house  of  York.  But  he  was  more  doubtful  of  the  raising  of  forces  to  resist 
the  rebels  than  of  the  resistance  itself,  for  that  he  was  in  a  core  of  people 
whose  affections  he  suspected.  But  the  action  enduring  no  delay,  he  did 
speedily  levy  and  send  against  the  Lord  Lovell  to  the  number  of  three  thou- 
sand men,  ill  armed,  but  well  assured  (being  taken  some  few  out  of  his  own 
train,  and  the  rest  out  of  the  tenants  and  follower!  of  such  as  were  safe  to 
be  trusted),  under  the  conduct  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford.  And  as  Ms  manner 
was  to  send  his  pardons  rather  before  the  sword  than  after,  he  gave  commis- 
sion to  the  Duke  to  proclaim  pardon  to  all  that  would  come  in,  which  the 
Duke,  upon  his  approach  to  the  Lord  Lovell's  camp,  did  perform.  And  it 
fell  out  as  the  King  expected;  the  heralds  were  the  great  ordnance." 

The  effect  of  the  vigorous  expression  is  enhanced  by  the  pene- 
trating ingenuity  and  freshness  of  the  thought.  We  spoke  of  this 
in  our  survey  of  his  character.  The  pleasure  of  reading  him  is 
almost  purely  dependent  upon  the  exercise  of  the  intellect  How 
little  gratification  he  affords  to  ordinary  human  feeling  will  be 
made  apparent  by  a  single  example.  Contrast  the  following  with 
Hooker's  manner  of  approaching  a  similar  theme  ;  Bacon's  subtlety 
is  at  work  to  discover  arguments  where  Hooker  is  lost  in  adora- 
tion : — 

"First,  therefore,  let  us  seek  the  dignity  of  knowledge  in  the  archetype  or 
first  platfonn,  which  is  in  the  attributes  and  acts  of  God,  as  far  as  they  are 
revealed  to  man,  and  may  be  observed  with  sobriety  ;  wherein  we  may  not 
seek  it  by  the  name  of  learning ;  for  all  learning  is  knowledge  acquired, 
and  all  knowledge  in  God  is  original ;  and  therefore  we  must  luok  for  it  by 
another  name,  that  of  wisdom  or  sapience,  as  the  Scriptures  call  it. 

"  It  is  so,  then,  that  in  the  work  of  the  creation  we  see  a  double  emanation 
of  virtue  from  God  ;  the  one  referring  more  properly  to  power,  the  other  to 
wisdom ;  the  one  expressed  in  making  the  subsistence  of  the  matter,  and 
the  other  in  disposing  the  beauty  of  the  form.  This  being  supposed,  it  is  to 
be  observed  that  for  anything  which  appeareth  in  the  history  of  the  cre/ation, 


FRANCIS  BACON.  251 

the  confused  mass  and  matter  of  heaven  and  earth  was  made  in  a  moment ; 
and  the  order  and  disposition  of  that  chaos  or  mass  was  the  work  of  six 
days;  such  a  note  of  difference  it  pleased  God  to  ]>ut  upon  the  works  of 
power  and  the  works  of  wisdom  ;  wherewith  concurreth  that  in  the  former 
it  is  not  set  down  that  God  said,  Let  there  be  heaven  and  eartii,  as  it  is  set 
down  of  the  works  following,  but  actually  that  God  made  heaven  and  earth  : 
the  one  carrying  the  style  of  a  manufacture,  and  the  other  of  a  law,  decree, 
or  counsel. 

"  To  proceed  to  that  which  is  next  in  order  from  God  to  spirits  ;  we  find 
«s  far  as  credit  is  to  be  given  to  the  celestial  hierarchy  of  that  supposed 
Dionysius,  the  senator  of  Athens,  the  first  jiJace  or  degree  is  given  to  the 
angels  of  love,  which  are  termed  seraphim ;  the  second  to  the  angels  of 
light,  which  are  termed  cherubim  ;  and  the  third,  and  so  following  places, 
to  thrones,  principalities,  and  the  rest,  which  are  all  angels  of  power  and 
ministry,  so  as  the  angels  of  knowledge  and  illumination  are  placed  before 
the  angels  of  office  and  domination." 

Though  not  naturally  inclined  to  address  the  feelings  so  much 
as  the  reason,  Bacon  knew,  and  upon  occasion  practised,  the  arts 
of  elevation.  The  chief  English  specimen  of  his  more  ambitious 
rhetoric  is  a  discourse  in  praise  of  the  Queen,  written  when  he  was 
about  thirty.  It  is  a  very  good  example  of  artificial  strength.  In 
the  following  sample,  the  strength  is  gained  chiefly  by  figures  of 
speech  proper, — by  declamatory  departure  from  the  ordinary  forms 
of  speech : — 

"To  speak  of  her  fortune,  that  which  I  did  reserve  for  a  garland  of  her 
honour  ;  and  that  is  that  she  liveth  a  virgin,  and  hath  no  children  ;  so  it  is 
that  which  maketh  all  her  other  virtues  ami  acts  more  sacred,  more  august, 
more  divine.  Let  them  leave  children  that  leave  no  other  memory  in  their 
times.  Brutorum  cetemitas,  soboles.  Revolve  in  histories  the  memoiies  of 
happy  men,  and  you  shall  not  find  any  of  rare  felicity,  but  either  he  died 
childless,  or  his  line  spent  soon  after  his  death,  or  else  was  unfortunate  in 
his  children.  Should  a  man  have  them  to  be  slain  by  his  vassals,  as  the 
posthumus  of  Alexander  the  Great  was  ?  or  to  call  them  his  impostliuines,  as 
Augustus  Caesar  called  his  ?  Peruse  the  catalogue — Cornelius  Sylla,  Julius 
Caesar,  Flavius  Vespasianus,  Severus,  Constautiuus  the  Great,  and  manj 
more." 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  this  forced  declamation  with  the 
ingenious  antithetic  conceits  on  the  same  theme  in  his  Essay  on 
Parents  and  Children  : — 

"  The  perpetuity  by  generation  is  common  to  beasts  ;  but  memory,  merit, 
and  noble  works  are  proper  to  men.  And  surely  a  man  shall  see  the  noblest 
works  and  foundations  have  proceeded  from  childless  men,  which  have 
sought  to  express  the  images  of  their  minds  where  those  ot  their  bodies  Jiavfl 
failed.  So  the  care  of  posterity  is  most  in  them  that  have  no  posterity. " 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Narrative. — Bacon's  '  History  of  Henry  VII.'  was  written  upon 
a  principle  enounced  in  his  '  Advancement  of  Learning.'  After 
saying  that  history  is  of  three  kinds  according  as  "  it  representetb 


252  FROM   1610   TO   1640. 

a  time,  or  a  person,  or  an  action,"  and  that  "  the  first  we  call 
chronicles,  the  second  lives,  and  the  third  narrations  or  relations," 
he  goes  on — 

"  Of  these,  although  the  first  be  the  most  complete  and  absolute  kind  of 
history,  and  hath  most  estimation  aiul  glory,  yet  the  second  excelleth  it  in 
profit  and  use,  and  the  third  in  verity  and  sincerity.  For  the  history  of 
times  representeth  the  magnitude  of  actions,  and  the  public  faces  and 
deportments  of  persons,  and  passeth  over  in  silence  the  smaller  passages  and 
motions  of  men  and  matters.  But  such  being  the  workmanship  of  God, 
as  He  doth  hang  the  greatest  weight  upon  the  smallest  wires,  maxima  e 
minimis  suspendens,  it  comes  therefore  to  pass  that  such  histories  do  rul/isr 
net  forth  the  pomp  of  business  than  Die  true  and  inward  resorts  thereof.  I'.ut 
lives,  if  they  be  well  written,  propounding  to  themselves  a  person  to  repre- 
sent, in  whom  actions  both  greater  and  smaller,  public  and  private,  have 
a  commixture,  must  of  necessity  contain  a  more  true,  native,  and  lively 
representation. " 

This  ideal  of  history  bears  some  resemblance  to  Carlyle's  anti- 
Dryasdnst  views.  Bacon,  a  more  acute  and  dispassionate  observer 
than  the  historian  of  Friedrich,  and  practically  acquainted  with 
the  ends  and  expedients  of  kings,  has  left  us  what  is  probably  the 
very  best  history  of  its  kind.  He  wrote  it  in  a  few  months, 
taking  his  facts  from  the  Chroniclers,  and  having  access  to  few,  if 
any,  original  documents ;  and  consequently  its  peculiar  merit  is 
not  accuracy :  still,  even  if  it  is  taken  on  that  ground,  his  sagacity 
and  knowledge  of  state  affairs  proved  so  true  a  guide,  that  his 
views  of  the  main  actions  have  not  been  set  aside  by  more  patient 
investigators.  Considered  on  its  own  claims  as  an  explanation  of 
events  by  reference  to  the  feelings  and  purposes  of  the  chief  actor, 
it  is  perhaps  a  better  model  than  any  history  that  has  been  pub- 
lished since.  "  He  gives,"  says  Bishop  Nicholson,  "as  sprightly  a 
view  of  the  secrets  of  Henry's  Council  as  if  he  had  been  President 
of  it" 

In  one  .respect  Bacon's  History  is  in  strong  contrast  to  Macau- 
lay's.  In  relating  the  schemes  and  actions  of  such  a  king  as 
Henry,  Macaulay  would  Lave  overlaid  the  narrative  with  strong 
expressions  of  approval  or  disapproval.  Bacon  writes  calmly, 
narrating  facts  and  motives  without  any  comment  of  a  moral 
nature.  Sometimes,  indeed,  he  criticises,  but  it  is  from  the  point 
of  view  of  a  politician,  not  of  a  moralist ;  a  piece  of  cruelty  or 
perfidy  is  either  censured  only  as  being  injudicious,  or  not  com- 
mented upon  at  all.  On  this  ground  he  is  visited  with  a  sonorous 
declamation  by  Sir  James  Mackintosh — as  if  his  not  improving 
the  occasion  were  a  sign  that  he  approved  of  what  had  been  done. 
Bacon  wrote  upon  a  principle  that  is  beginning  to  be  pretty 
widely  accepted  as  regards  personal  histories  claiming  to  be  im- 
partial— namely,  that  "  it  is  the  true  office  of  history  to  represent 
the  events  themselves  together  with  the  counsels,  and  to  leave  the 


FRANCIS  BACON.  253 

observations  and  conclusions  thereupon  to  the  liberty  and  faculty 
of  every  man's  judgment"  He  does  not  seek  to  seal  up  historical 
facts  from  the  useful  office  of  "pointing  a  moral";  he  only  held 
that  the  moralising  should  not  interfere  with  the  narrative. 

Exposition. —  We  have  said  that  the  modern  expositor  has  not 
much  to  learn  from  earlier  writers.  An  exception  in  one  respect 
may  be  claimed  for  Bacon.  Though  all  his  scientific  matter  has 
been  superseded,  and  his  style  is  now  antiquated,  the  '  Advance- 
ment of  Learning'  might  still  be  read  as  a  general  tonic  for  inci- 
sive expression  and  perspicuous  method.  At  the  same  time,  it 
would  be  a  mistake  for  the  student  to  go  to  Bacon  before  he  had 
in  some  degree  mastered  the  style  of  modern  exposition.  To  read 
the  productions  of  Bacon's  vigorous  and  subtle  intellect  has  a 
bracing  influence,  but  we  must  first  be  confirmed  against  the 
affectation  of  trying  to  imitate. 

The  'Sylva  Sylvarum'  lias  little  value  as  regards  expository 
style,  being  merely  a  record  of  experiments  and  observations,  with 
speculations  thereupon.  The  following  on  "the  goodness  and 
choice  of  waters  "  is  an  example  of  the  style ;  it  also  illustrates  the 
scientific  worthlessness  of  many  of  his  statements  : — 

"It  is  a  tiling  of  very  good  use  to  discover  the  goodness  of  waters.  The 
taste,  to  those  that  drink  water  only,  is  somewhat :  but  other  experiments 
are  more  sure.  First,  try  waters  by  weight ;  wherein  you  may  find  some 
difference,  though  not  much ;  and  the  lighter  you  may  account  the 
better.  .  .  . 

"Sixthly,  you  may  make  a  judgment  of  waters  according  to  the  place 
whence  they  spring  or  come.  The  rain-water  is  by  the  physicians  esteemed 
the  finest  and  the  best ;  but  yet  it  is  said  to  putrefy  soonest,  which  is  likely 
because  of  tho  fineness  of  the  spirit ;  and  in  conservatories  of  rain-water 
(such  as  they  have  in  Venice,  &c.)  they  are  found  not  so  choice  waters  ;  the 
worse  perhaps  because  they  are  covered  aloft,  and  kept  from  the  sun. 
Snow-water  is  held  unwholesome ;  insomuch  as  the  people  that  dwell  at 
the  foot  of  the  snow-mountains  or  otherwise  upon  the  ascent  (especially  the 
women),  by  drinking  of  snow-water,  have  great  bags  under  their  throats. 
Well-water,  except  it  be  upon  chalk,  or  a  very  plentiful  spring,  maketh 
meat  red,  which  is  an  ill  sign.  Springs  on  the  top  of  high  hills  ;ire  the 
best ;  for  both  they  seem  to  have  a  lightness  and  appetite  of  mounting ; 
and  besides,  they  are  most  pure  and  unmingled  ;  and  again  are  more  per- 
colated through  a  great  space  of  earth.  For  waters  in  valleys  join  in  effect 
underground  with  all  waters  of  the  same  level ;  whereas  springs  on  the  tops 
of  hills  pass  through  a  great  deal  of  pure  earth  with  less  mixture  of  other 
waters. " 

Persuasion. —  His  power  as  an  orator  is  attested  by  two  eminent 
authorities.  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  says  that  he  surpassed  other  men 
in  speaking  as  much  as  he  did  in  writing ;  and  Ben  Jonson,  in  his 
4  Discoveries,'  affirms  that — "  His  hearers  could  not  cough  or  look 
aside  from  him  without  loss.  He  commanded  when  he  spoke,  and 
had  his  judges  angry  or  pleased  at  his  devotion.  No  man  had 
their  affections  more  in  his  power."  Making  every  allowance  for 


254  FROM   1610  TO   1640. 

grateful  exaggeration  in  Ben  Jonson's  eulogy,  we  can  still  believe 
that  Bacon  was  indeed  a  very  convincing  speaker.  He  was  not  a 
aeclaiiner ;  he  would  not  seem  to  have  spoken  with  heat  and  fer- 
vour :  if  we  raise  upon  Ben  Jonson's  description  a  picture  of  a 
hushed  audience  listening  to  a  glowing  orator,  we  shall  be  very  far 
from  the  probable  reality.  A  studied  orator,  he  affected  gravity 
and  weight;  speaking  "leisurely,  and  rather  drawingly  than 
hastily,"  on  the  principle  that  "a  slow  speech  confirmeth  the 
memory,  addeth  a  conceit  of  wisdom  to  the  hearers,  besides  a 
seemliness  of  speech  and  countenance."  From  all  that  we  know, 
it  seems  unmistakable  that  he  addressed  chiefly  the  self-interest 
and  confirmed  passions  of  his  audience.  The  main  study  of  his 
life  was  how  to  "  work  "  men. 

His  verbal  ingenuity  was  great,  and  carefully  cultivated.  Under 
the  title  of  '  Promus  of  Formularies  and  Elegancies,'  Mr  Spedding 
has  published  some  specimens  of  his  store  of  happy  expressions, 
repartees,  epigrams,  quotations  from  all  scources,  laid  up  for  use 
upon  fitting  occasions.  His  collection  of  apothegms  was  another 
part  of  the  same  elaborate  preparation.  In  his  preface  he  says : 
"  Certainly  they  are  of  excellent  use.  They  are  mucrones  verborum, 
pointed  speeches.  Cicero  prettily  calls  them  salinas,  salt-pits  ;  that 
you  may  extract  salt  out  of,  and  sprinkle  it  where  you  will.  They 
serve  to  be  interlaced  in  continued  speech.  They  serve  to  be  re- 
cited upon  occasion  of  themselves.  They  serve  if  you  take  out 
the  kernel  of  them,  and  make  them  your  own." 

Another  of  his  studies  for  Persuasion  appears  in  a  fragment  first 
published  in  1597,  entitled  'Of  the  Colours  of  Good  and  Evil,'  or, 
more  fully,  '  A  Table  of  Colours  or  Appearances  of  Good  and  Evil, 
and  their  Degrees,  as  places  of  Persuasion  and  Dissuasion,  and 
their  several  Fallaxes  and  the  Blenches  of  them.'  In  the  begin- 
ning he  says  that  "  the  persuader's  labour  is  to  make  things  appear 
good  or  evil,  and  that  in  higher  or  lower  degree ;  which  as  it  may 
be  performed  by  true  and  solid  reasons,  so  it  may  be  represented 
also  by  colours,  popularities,  and  circumstances,  which  are  of  such 
force,  as  they  sway  the  ordinary  judgment  either  of  a  weak  man, 
or  of  a  wise  man  not  fully  and  considerately  attending  and  ponder- 
ing the  matter.  One  of  these  "  Colours  "  may  be  quoted  as  an 
example  of  his  ingenuity  :  he  himself  would  probably  have  been 
prepared  to  use  and  enforce  either  side  according  as  he  found  it 
necessary  : — 

' '  That  course  which  keeps  the  matter  in  a  man's  power  is  good  ;  that  which 
leaves  him  without  retreat  is  bad  ;  for  to  have  no  means  of  retreating  is  to  be 
in  a  sort  powerless  ;  and  power  is  a  good  thing. 

"  Appertaining  to  this  persuasion,  the  forms  are,  you  shall  engage  yourself ; 
on  the  other  side,  tantum  quantum  voles  suines  cxfortuna,  &c. — you  sliall 


DIVINES   UNDER  JAMES.  255 

k«ei>  the  matter  in  your  own  hands.  The  reprehension  of  it  is,  that  proceed- 
intf  and  resolving  in  all  actions  is  necessary  ;  for  as  he  saith  well,  not  to 
resolve  i-i  to  resolve;  and  many  times  it  breeds  as  many  necessities,  and 
engageth  as  far  in  some  other  sort,  as  to  resolve. 

"  So  it  is  but  the  covetous  man's  disease  translated  into  power  ;  for  the 
covetous  man  will  enjoy  nothing,  because  he  will  have  his  full  store  and 
possibility  to  enjoy  more  ;  so  by  this  reason  a  man  should  execute  nothing, 
because  he  should  be  still  indifferent  and  at  liberty  to  execute  anything. 
Besides  necessity  and  this  same  jacta  est  alea  "  ["the  die  is  cast  "]  "  hath 
many  times  an  advantage,  because  it  awaketh  the  powers  of  the  mind,  and 
ttrengtheneth  endeavour. " 

OTHER  WRITERS. 

DIVINES  UNDER  JAMES. — During  the  reign  of  James  the  Puri- 
tans gave  little  trouble.  Forbearing  open  controversy,  they  gained 
ground  among  the  people  by  their  exemplary  lives,  and  left  the 
literary  champions  of  conformity  to  other  employment.  Richard 
Field,  1561-1616,  celebrated  at  Oxford  as  a  disputant,  and  a  fa- 
vourite royal  chaplain  under  James,  wrote  a  treatise  to  prove  that 
the  English  Church  was  the  Church  of  early  Christianity,  and  that 
the  Roman  Catholic  peculiarities  were  of  modern  origin.  His  style 
is  periodic  and  sonorous,  without  containing  unidiomatie  inver- 
sions. He  argues  with  considerable  vigour,  and  occasionally 
warms  into  impressive  declamation.  Lancelot  Andrewes,  1555- 
1626,  Bishop  of  Winchester,  and  a  Privy  Councillor,  was  a  man  of 
greater  vivacity.  He  was  a  favourite  with  Bacon,  who  records 
some  of  his  witty  apothegms.  As  a  bishop  he  was  hospitable 
and  munificent  He  was  celebrated  for  his  knowledge  of  lan- 
guages. The  fact  that  he  was  the  most  popular  preacher  at 
Court,  both  with  Elizabeth  and  with  James,  shows  us  whence  the 
fashions  of  cumbrously  superfluous  quotation  and  fanciful  word-play 
-came  into  the  sermon -writing  of  this  and  the  following  period. 
In  redundant  display  of  learning  he  goes  beyond  even  Jeremy 
Taylor  ;  and  his  word-play  is  after  the  manner  we  have  illustrated 
from  Ascham  and  Lyly.  Bishop  Morton,  1564-1659,  a  descendant 
from  Cardinal  Morton,  was  a  voluminous  author,  chiefly  of  con- 
troversial works ;  but  the  length,  abstemiousness,  and  kindly 
generosity  of  his  life,  and  the  troubles  of  his  later  years,  will  do 
more  to  preserve  his  memory  than  genius  either  in  thought  or 
expression.  John  Donne,  1573-1631,  the  founder  of  the  "Meta- 
physical "  school  of  poetry,  having  ruined  his  prospects  of  advance- 
ment in  secular  office  by  an  imprudent  marriage,  after  some  ten 
years'  uneasy  waiting  for  employment,  was  urged  by  King  James 
to  enter  the  Church,  and  was  ordained  in  1616.  As  compared  with 
Andrewes,  Donne  has  the  same  characteristic^  of  excessive  quo- 
tation and  fanciful  wit ;  still  the  two  are  very  different.  For  one 
thing,  though  that  is  not  so  striking,  they  draw  their  quotations 


256  FROM   1610  TO   1640. 

from  different  sources :  Donne  is  specially  read  in  the  Latin 
classics.  They  differ  chiefly  in  force  of  intellect.  Donne  is  more 
powerful  and  original ;  divides  and  distinguishes  with  greater 
subtlety,  and  fetches  his  images  from  a  greater  distance.  Jn 
Donne's  sermons,  an  intellectual  epicure  not  too  fastidious  to  read 
sermons  will  find  a  delicious  feast.  Whether  these  sermons  can 
be  taken  as  patterns  by  the  modern  preacher  is  another  affair.  It 
will  not  be  contended  that  any  congregation  is  equal  to  the  effort 
of  following  his  subtleties.  In  short,  as  exercises  in  abstract 
subtlety,  fanciful  ingenuity,  and  scholarship,  the  sermons  are 
admirable.  Judged  by  the  first  rule  of  popular  exposition,  the 
style  is  bad — a  bewildering  maze  to  the  ordinary  reader,  much 
more  to  the  ordinary  hearer.  In  the  specimens  that  we  quote 
there  is  no  want  of  distinct  order,  but  the  expression  is  in  the 
highest  degree  abstract  and  subtle.  They  are  taken  from  a  sermon 
on  St  Paul  at  Malta,  the  text  being,  "  They  changed  their  minds, 
and  said  that  he  was  a  god  " : — 

"The  first  words  of  our  text  carry  us  necessarily  so  far  back  as  to  see 
from  what  they  changed  ;  and  their  periods  are  easily  seen  :  their  terminus 
a  quo  and  their  terminus  ad  quern,  were  these  ;  first  that  he  was  a  murderer, 
then  that  he  was  a  god.  An  error  in  morality  ;  they  censure  deeply  upon 
light  evidence  :  an  error  in  divinity ;  they  transfer  the  name  and  estimation 
of  a  god  upon  an  unknown  man.  Place  both  the  errors  in  divinity  (so  you 
may  justly  do) ;  and  then  there  is  an  error  in  charity,  a  hasty  and  incon- 
siderate condemning ;  and  an  error  in  faith,  a  superstitious  creating  of  an 
imaginary  god.  Now  upon  these  two  general  considerations  will  this  exer- 
cise consist;  first  that  it  is  natural  lo«ic,  an  argumentation  naturally  im- 
printed in  man,  to  argue,  and  conclude  thus:  Great  calamities  are  inflicted, 
therefore  God  is  greatly  provoked.  These  men  of  Malta  were  but  natural 
men,  but  barbarians  (as  S.  Luke  calls  them),  and  yet  they  argue  and  con- 
clude so  :  Here  is  a  judgment  executed,  therefore  here  is  evidence  that  God 
is  displeased.  And  so  far  they  kept  within  the  limits  of  humanity  and 
piety  too.  But  when  they  descended  hastily  and  inconsiderately  to  partic- 
ular and  personal  applications, — This  judgment  upon  this  man  is  an  evi- 
dence of  his  guiltiness  in  this  offeuce,  then  they  transgressed  the  bounds  of 
charity  ;  that  because  a  viper  had  seized  Paul's  hand,  therefore  Paul  must 
needs  be  a  murderer. 

"  So  that  for  this  doctrine  "  (the  natural  "  argumentation  "  above  spoken 
of)  "  a  man  needs  not  be  preached  unto,  a  man  needs  not  be  catechised  ;  a 
man  needs  not  read  the  fathers,  nor  the  councils,  nor  the  schoolmen,  nor 
the  ecclesiastical  story,  nor  summists,  nor  casuists,  nor  canonists ;  no  nor 
the  Bible  itself  for  this  doctrine  ;  for  this  doctrine,  that  when  God  strikes 
He  is  angry,  and  when  He  is  angry  He  strikes,  the  natural  man  hath  as  lull 
a  library  in  his  bosom  as  the  Christian. 

"  The  same  author  of  ours,  Moses,  tells  us,  '  The  Lord  our  God  is  Lord  of 
lords,  and  God  of  gods,  and  regardeth  no  man's  person.'  The  natural  man 
hath  his  author  too,  that  tells  him,  Semper  viryinm  furice, — the  furies  (they 
whom  they  conceive  to  execute  revenge  upon  malefnctors)  are  always  virgins, 
that  is,  not  to  be  corrupted  by  any  solicitations.  That  no  dignity  shelters  a 


DIVINES    UNDER   CHARLES   L  257 

man  from  the  justice  of  God,  is  a  natural  conclusion,  as  well  as  a  divine. 
We  have  a  sweet  singer  of  Israel  that  tells  us,  A'o?i  dimidiabit  dies,  'The 
bloody  and  deceitful  man  shall  not  live  out  half  his  days '  ;  and  the  natural 
man  hath  his  sweet  singer  too,  a  learned  poet,  that  tells  him,  that  seldom 
any  enormous  malefactor  enjoys  siccam  mortem  (as  he  calls  it),  a  dry,  an  un- 
bloody death.  That  blood  requires  blood  is  a  natural  conclusion  as  well  as 
a  divine.  Our  sweet  sin^i-r  tells  us  again,  that  if  he  fly  to  the  farthest  ends 
of  the  earth,  or  to  the  sea,  or  to  heaven,  or  to  hell,  he  shall  find  God  there ; 
and  the  natural  man  hath  his  author  that  tells  him,  Quifugit,  non  effugit,  he 
that  runs  away  from  God  does  not  scape  God.  That  there  is  no  sanctuary, 
no  privileged  place,  against  which  God's  Quo  Warranto  does  not  lie,  is  a 
natural  conclusion  as  well  as  a  divine.  Sanguis  Abel,  is  our  proverb,  that 
Abel's  blood  cries  for  revenge ;  and  Sanguis  ^Esopi  is  the  natural  man's 
proverb,  that  Esop's  blood  cries  for  revenge  ;  for  Esop's  blood,"  &c. 

Besides  his  Sermons,  Donne's  most  famous  prose  work  is 
4  Biathanatos,'  a  treatise  on  Suicide. 

DIVINES  UNDEB  CHARLES  L — Joseph  Hall,  1574-1656,  is  illus- 
trious in  the  Church  history  of  England  chiefly  through  his  efforts 
to  reconcile  Dissenters  with  the  Established  Church.  Though 
professedly  anxious  for  religious  union,  he  was  a  stanch  adherent 
to  Episcopacy,  and  wrote  in  its  defence  against  both  Presbyterian- 
ism  and  Romanism.  His  literary  career  extends  through  nearly 
sixty  years.  His  first  work  consisted  of  three  books  of  '  Satires,' 
published  in  1597,  and  other  three  published  the  following  year — 
performances  which  are  praised  even  by  such  an  authority  as  Pope. 
In  1608-11  he  published  his  'Epistles.'1  His  best-known  prose 
works  are  his  '  Contemplations  '  on  Scripture,  often  quoted  in 
popular  commentaries,  and  his  '  Occasional  Meditations,'  one  of 
his  latest  productions.  Both  as  a  writer  and  as  a  preacher  his 
reputation  stands  high.  With  less  scholarship  and  wit  than  An- 
drewes,  and  less  original  power  than  Donne  or  Taylor,  he  writes 
with  great  fluency  and  energy,  and  with  much  better  taste  than 
any  of  these  writers.  Some  have  called  him  the  best  preachei 
of  that  century — no  small  honour  among  such  giants ;  and  un- 
doubtedly, for  pulpit  oratory,  his  strong  feelings  and  fluent  ex 
pression,  guided  by  superior  taste,  would  be  more  effective  thai* 
the  undisciplined  profusion  and  originality  of  his  great  rivals. 
Certainly,  though  he  had  not  the  genius  of  Donne  or  Taylor,  he  is 
a  man  of  great  mark  in  the  history  of  our  literature.  The  variety 
as  well  as  the  power  of  his  writings  challenges  attention.  Over 
and  above  his  voluminous  works  connected  with  religion,  he  claims 
to  be  the  first  English  Satirist,  the  first  English  writer  of  Epistles^ 

1  These  Epistles  are  sometimes  said  to  be  the  first  collection  of  "  letters  "  in 
the  English  language.  Such  a  statement  involves  a  slight  confusion  of  names. 
Hall's  Epistles  are  not  "  letters  "  at  all  in  the  sense  of  correspondence  on  pass- 
ing events,  but  are  really  moral  and  religious  discussions  in  the  epistolary  form. 
To  prevent  confusion,  they  had  better  be  allowed  to  keep  their  title  of  '  Epistles.' 

B 


208  FROM  1610  TO   1640. 

and  his  '  Mundus  Alter  et  Idem  '  (Another  World  yet  the  Same)  ia 
said  (though  that  is  disputed)  to  have  furnished  Swift  with  the 
idea  of  '  Gulliver's  Travels.'  l 

The  character  and  opinions  of  the  "  immortal  Chillingwortb," 
1602-1644,  attract  interest ;  his  style  is  as  finished,  clear,  and 
vigorous  as  any  that  was  written  in  his  day ;  and  he  argues  with 
great  force.  He  was  a  distinguished  student  at  Oxford,  a  versatile 
scholar,  eminent  both  in  mathematics  and  in  poetry,  and  noted  for 
the  confident  independence  of  his  views,  and  fearlessness  in  assert- 
ing and  acting  up  to  them.  His  patron  was  Laud,  and  it  needed 
no  little  policy  to  keep  so  erratic  and  independent  a  genius  in  the 
orthodox  track.  He  was  first  gained  over  by  the  Roman  Catholics ; 
and  when  regained,  he  refused  to  sign  the  Church  formulas,  con- 
senting only  when  it  was  urged  that  they  were  merely  bonds  of 
peace  and  union,  .and  that  subscription  did  not  imply  belief  of  the 
whole  At  the  siege  of  Gloucester,  he  showed  his  versatility  by 
proposing  certain  siege  engines  on  a  Roman  model.  Before  the 
King  at  Oxford,  he  boldly  attacked  the  vices  of  the  Cavaliers. 
His  chief  work  is  '  The  Religion  of  Protestants  a  Safe  Way  to  Sal- 
vation,' &c.,  1637.  It  is  a  remarkably  bold  and  liberal  book.  He  is 
not  tied  down  to  his  own  Church ;  by  the  "  religion  of  Protestants  " 
he  understands  neither  "the  doctrine  of  Luther,  or  Calvin,  or 
Melanchthon ;  nor  the  Confession  of  Augusta,  or  Geneva ;  nor  the 
Catechism  of  Heidelberg,  nor  the  Articles  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land— no,  nor  the  harmony  of  Protestant  Confessions,"  but  "  the 
Bible,  and  THE  BIBLE  ONLY."  His  work  is  undoubtedly  the  germ 
of  Taylor's  '  Liberty  of  Prophesying,'  published  ten  years  later ; 
and  it  breathes  a  still  bolder  and  wider  spirit  of  tolerance  : — 

"  I  see  plainly,  and  with  mine  own  eyes,  that  there  are  Popes  against 
Popes,  councils  against  councils,  some  fathers  against  others,  the  same 
fathers  against  themselves,  a  consent  of  fathers  of  one  age  against  a  consent 
of  fathers  of  another  age,  the  Church  of  one  age  against  the  Church  of 
another  age.  ...  In  a  word,  there  is  no  sufficient  certainty  but  of 
Scripture  only  for  any  considering  man  to  build  upon.  .  .  .  Projx>se 
me  anything  out  of  this  Book,  and  require  whether  I  believe  or  no,  and 
seem  it  never  so  incomprehensible  to  human  reason,  I  will  subscribe  it 
with  hand  and  heart,  as  knowing  no  demonstration  can  be  stronger  than 
this.  God  hath  said  so,  therefore  it  is  true.  In  other  things  I  will  take 
no  man's  liberty  of  judgment  from  him  ;  neither  shall  any  man  take  mine 
from  me.  1  will  think  no  man  the  worse  man  nor  the  worse  Christian : 
I  will  love  no  man  the  less  for  differing  in  opinion  from  me.  .  .  . 
I  am  fully  assured  that  God  does  not,  and  therefore  that  men  ought  not 
to  require  any  more  of  any  man  than  this,  to  believe  the  Scripture  to  be 

1  Like  other  writers  of  the  time,  he  has  his  pedantic  nickname.  Sir  Henry 
Wotton  called  him  the  English  Seneca,  probably  because  he  wrote  Satires, 
Epistles,  and  Moral  Essays.  Fuller  says — "  He  was  commonly  called  our 
English  Seueca,  for  the  pureness,  plainness,  and  fulness  of  his  style ;  not  ill  at 
controversies,  more  happy  at  comments,  very  good  in  characters,  best  of  alJ  in 
meditations. 


HISTORY.  259 

God's  Word,  to  endeavour  to  find  the  true  sense  of  it,  and  to  live  according 
to  it." 

The  "  ever-memorable  John  Hales,"  1584-1656,  was  before  even 
Chillingworth  in  advocating  tolerance.  In  his  tract  on  "  Schism 
and  Schismatics,"  published  in  1628,  he  boldly  asserted  that 
"  Church  authority  is  none."  The  chief  public  incident  in  his 
life  was  his  attendance  at  the  Synod  of  Dort,  1618-19;  his  letters 
written  at  the  time  contain  perhaps  the  best  account  of  its  pro- 
ceedings. He  wrote  little :  some  of  his  sermons  and  tracts  were 
collected  into  a  volume  in  1659,  after  his  death.  He  was  a  little 
man  with  "a  most  ingenuous  countenance,  sanguine,  cheerful,  and 
full  of  air"  He  had  a  high  reputation  for  learning,  wit,  and 
courteous  manner.  His  style  is  simple  and  felicitous.  ' 

HISTORY. 

This  period  very  nearly  saw  the  end  of  the  last  of  the  Chron- 
iclers, Sir  Richard  Baker,  1568-1645,  whose  work,  '  A  Chronicle 
of  the  Kings  of  England,  from  the  Time  of  the  Romans'  Gov- 
ernment unto  the  Death  of  King  James,'  was  published  in  1641. 
Baker's  name,  though  not  his  fame,  has  been  kept  alive  by  his 
connection  with  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  in  the  '  Spectator ' : 
Addison,  ridiculing  the  simple  ignorance  of  the  Tory  squires  in 
the  person  of  Sir  Roger,  makes  him  quote  Sir  Richard  Baker  as 
a  great  authority.  Poor  Sir  Richard  is  visited  quite  as  bitterly 
as  his  rustic  admirer : — 

"The  glorious  names  of  Henry  the  Fifth  and  Queen  Elizabeth  gave  the 
Knight  great  opportunities  of  shining,  and  of  doing  justice  to  Sir  Richard 
Baker,  who,  as  our  Knight  observed  with  some  surprise,  had  a  great  'many 
kings  in  him  whose  monuments  he  had  not  seen  in  the  Abbey. " 

Baker's  popularity  with  country  gentlemen  was  probably  due 
to  his  style,  which  is  praised  by  such  an  authority  as  Sir  Henry 
Wotton — "  full  of  sweet  raptures  and  researching  conceits,  nothing 
borrowed,  nothing  vulgar,  and  yet  all  glowing  with  a  certain  equal 
facility." 

Two  antiquaries  survived  from  the  illustrious  knot  of  King 
James's  reign  through  the  whole  of  this  generation  and  far  into 
the  next  James  Usher  or  Ussher,  Archbishop  of  Armagh, 
1581-1656,  and  John  Selden,  lawyer  and  politician,  Keeper  of 
the  Records  in  the  Tower,  1584-1654,  were  intimate  with  Camden, 
Spelman,  and  Cotton.  Both  were  men  of  some  fortune :  Usher 
inherited  a  good  estate,  but  retained  only  a  competency,  resigning 
the  rest  to  his  brother ;  and  Selden,  having  a  lucrative  practice  as 
a  consulting  lawyer  and  a  conveyancer,  possessed,  as  Fuller  said, 
"  a  number  of  coins  of  the  Roman  Emperors,  and  a  good  many 
more  of  the  later  English  Kings."  Their  principal  antiquarian 


260  FROM   1610  TO   1640. 

works  are  in  Latin.  Usher  is  an  authority  in  chronological 
matters:  his  '  Annales '  (1650-54)  settles  the  Chronology  of 
Ancient  History  from  the  Creation  to  the  Dispersion  of  the 
Jews.  He  wrote  also  voluminously  on  Church  Antiquities. 
Further,  he  was  a  royalist,  and  wrote  a  denunciation  of  armed 
resistance  to  the  King;  this  was  not  published  till  after  his 
death.  Sermons  and  Letters  were  also  published  posthumously. 
— Selden  was  an  antiquary  of  more  varied  accomplishments, 
writing  on  the  administration  of  Britain,  international  law,  the 
legal  antiquities  of  the  Jews,  the  gods  of  Syria,  the  Arundel 
Marbles,  old  English  Ballads,  &c.  In  politics,  both  of  State 
and  of  Church,  he  was  opposed  to  Usher ;  his  legal  learning 
and  skill  are  said  to  have  been  of  service  in  the  protestation 
against  James,  and  in  the  Petition  of  Right  against  Charles. 
A  cautious  man,  he  held  back  from  public  business  when  hia 
party  went  to  an  extreme.  Selden's  learning,  prudence,  and 
polite  affable  manner,  made  him  perhaps  the  most  generally 
respected  man  of  his  time —  respected  alike  by  Royalist  and  by 
Puritan.  As  a  writer  of  English,  he  is  known  by  his  '  History 
of  Tithes'  (1618),  which  otl'ended  the  clergy  by  denying  their 
divine  right  to  such  revenue  ;  but  chiefly  by  his  '  Table-Talk,' 
published  after  his  death.  The  style  of  his  writings  is  harsh, 
obscure,  and  antiquated ;  in  conversation  he  seems  to  have  been 
more  felicitous,  dealing  in  pointed  sententious  aphorisms  and 
witty  turns.  The  '  Table-Talk '  is  full  of  worldly  wisdom  and 
sarcasms  against  clerical  bigotry. 

Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury,  1581-1648,  a  high-minded  diplo- 
matist, known  in  philosophy  as  the  author  of  a  Latin  deistical 
treatise,  '  De  Veritate,'  wrote  a  history  of  the  Life  and  Reign 
of  King  Henry  V1IL  Those  that  differ  from  Lord  Herbert  most 
widely,  join  in  admiring  the  dignity  and  earnestness  of  his  char- 
acter. His  history  may  be  put  side  by  side  with  Lord  Bacon's 
'  History  of  Henry  VII.,'  as  one  of  the  best  historical  works 
published  before  1660.  His  style  is  not  so  clear,  flowing,  and 
pointed  as  Bacon's,  but  the  idiom  is  purer.  His  sagacity  in  the 
explanation  of  affairs  is  no  less  remarkable,  and  he  is  at  greater 
pains  to  make  sure  of  the  facts. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

"Rare"  Ben  Jonson  (1574-1637),  wrote  a  prose  work  entitled 
'Timber;  or,  Discoveries  made  on  Man  and  Matter' — a  series 
of  random  jottings  on  various  subjects,  containing  some  very 
sensible  literary  criticism.  He  does  not  affect  the  abrupt  dis- 
continuous style  of  Bacon's  Essays ;  he  writes  rather  in  a  free 
and  easy  conversational  style.  The  following  are  specimens  of 
his  literary  notes  : — 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  261 

"  And  as  it  is  fit  to  read  the  best  authors  to  youth  first,  so  let  them  be  of 
the  opeuest  and  clearest.  As  Livy  before  Sallust,  Sidney  before  Donne  : 
and  beware  of  letting  them  taste  Gower  or  Chaucer  at  first,  lest  falling  too 
much  in  love  with  antiquity,  and  not  apprehending  the  weight,  they  grow 
rough  and  barren  in  language  only." 

"  Periods  are  beautiful  when  they  are  not  too  long  :  for  so  they  have  their 
strength  too,  as  in  a  pike  or  javelin." 

The  following  is  partly  an  anticipation  of  Carlyle's  metaphor 
about  a  plethoric  style : — 

"We  say  it  is  a  fleshy  style  when  there  is  much  periphrasis  and  circuit 
of  words  :  and  when  with  more  than  enough,  it  grows  fat  and  corpulent.  It 
hath  blood  and  juice  when  the  words  are  proper  and  apt,  their  sound  sweet, 
and  the  phrase  neat  and  packed." 

His  criticism  of  Shakspeare  is  often  quoted,  almost  always 
without  the  qualification,  and  too  often  as  an  evidence  of  Ben's 
jealousy : — 

41 1  remember  the  players  have  often  mentioned  it  as  an  honour  to  Shak- 
speare,  that,  in  his  writing  (whatsoever  he  penned)  he  never  blotted  out  a 
line.  My  answer  has  always  been,  Would  he  had  blotted  out  a  thousand. 
Which  they  thought  a  malevolent  speech.  I  had  not  told  posterity  this  but 
for  their  ignorance  who  chose  that  circumstance  to  commend  their  friend 
by,  wherein  he  most  faulted  ;  and  to  justify  mine  own  candour  :  for  I 
loved  the  man,  and  do  honour  his  memory  on  this  side  idolatry,  as  much 
as  any." 

In  the  *  Reliquiae  Wottonianae,'  the  remains  of  Sir  Henry 
Wotton  (1568-1639), — a  wit  of  more  polish  than  Overbury, 
King  James's  favourite  diplomatist,  and  author  of  the  definition 
of  an  ambassador  as  "  an  honest  man  sent  to  lie  abroad  for  the 
good  of  his  country " — we  find  a  weighty  balance  of  sentence 
almost  as  finished  as  Johnson's.  The  following  is  a  sample : — 

"  Sometimes  the  possibility  of  preferment  prevailing  with  the  credulous, 
expectation  of  less  expense  with  the  covetous,  opinion  of  ease  with  the 
fond,  and  assurance  of  remoteness  with  the  unkind  parents,  Lave  moved 
them,  without  discretion,  to  engage  their  children  in  adventures  of  learn- 
ing, by  whose  return  they  have  received  but  small  contentment :  but  they 
who  are  deceived  in  their  first  designs  deserve  less  to  be  condemned,  as 
such  who,  after  sufficient  trial,  persist  in  their  wilfulness  are  noway  to  be 
pitied. " 

The  use  of  the  abstract  noun  makes  the  resemblance  to  the 
Johnsonian  structure  all  the  more  complete.  Here  is  another 
specimen  : — 

"The  fashion  of  commending  our  friends'  abilities  before  they  come  to 
trial  sometimes  takes  good  effect  with  the  common  sort,  who,  building  their 
belief  on  authority,  strive  to  follow  the  conceit  of  their  betters  ;  but  usually, 
amongst  men  of  independent  judgments,  this  bespeaking  of  opinion  breeds 
a  purpose  of  stricter  examination,  and  if  the  report  be  answered,  procures 
only  a  bare  acknowledgment,  whereas,"  &c. 


262  FROM   1610  TO   1640. 

Among  the  miscellaneous  writers  of  the  period  may  be  men- 
tioned two  travellers  :  George  Sandys  (1577-1643),  son  of  Arch- 
bishop Sandys,  translator  of  Ovid,  and  author  of  a  book  of 
'Travels  in  the  East'  (1615);  and  William  Lithgow  (d.  1640),  a 
Scotsman,  who,  during  the  reign  of  James,  spent  nineteen  years 
in  walking  through  "  the  most  famous  kingdoms  in  Europe,  Asia, 
and  Africa."  Sandys  was  an  accomplished  traveller,  with  a  con- 
stant eye  to  literary  effect ;  his  '  Travels '  went  through  many 
editions.  Lithgow  seems  to  have  walked  more  for  adventure, 
and  for  the  pleasure  of  boasting  how  many  places  he  had  visited, 
and  how  many  miles  he  had  walked  on  foot. 

We  must  also  mention  the  author  of  the  'Anatomy  of  Melan- 
choly,' the  recluse  student  of  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  Robert  Bur- 
ton (1576-1640).  A  grave  dyspeptic  man,  and  a  great  reader — 
"  confusedly  tumbling  over  divers  authors  in  our  libraries,  with 
small  profit  for  want  of  art,  order,  memory,  judgment  " — he  was 
eccentric  and  original,  and  picked  out  of  various  authors  an  enor- 
mous mass  of  quotations  suiting  his  peculiar  moods.  With  an 
immense  parade  of  divisions  and  subdivisions,  there  is  no  method 
in  his  book  ;  the  heading  of  a  section  is  little  clue  to  its  contents. 
His  enumeration  of  the  acts  characteristic  of  different  forms  of 
melancholy  is  wide  enough  to  include  every  son  of  Adam  in  the 
category  of  gloom.  The  leading  features  of  his  style,  if  style  it 
may  be  called,  are  profuse  quotation — several  authorities  being 
quoted  for  the  most  trivial  remark — and  long  strings  of  particular 
words  by  way  of  exhausting  a  general  subject,  poured  out  in  suc- 
cessive sentences  without  break.  Part  of  his  account  of  himself 
may  be  quoted  as  a  sample : — 

"I  am  not  poor,  I  am  not  rich ;  nihil  «£,  nihil  deeat,  I  have  nothing,  I 
want  nothing  :  all  my  treasure  is  in  Minerva's  tower.  Greater  preferment 
as  I  could  never  get,  so  am  1  not  in  debt  for  it,  I  have  a  competence  (laits 
Deo)  from  my  noble  and  munificent  patrons,  though  I  live  still  a  collegia!  e 
student,  as  Democritus  in  his  garden,  and  lead  a  monastic  life,  ipse  mild 
theatrum,  sequestered  from  those  tumults  and  troubles  of  the  world,  Et  tnn- 
quam  in  specula  positus  (as  he  said)  in  some  high  place  above  you  all,  like 
Stoictis  Sapiens,  omnia  ssecula,  prseterita  prsesentiaque  videns,  uno  vciut 
intuitu.  ...  A  mere  spectator  of  other  men's  fortunes  and  adventures, 
and  how  they  act  their  parts,  which  methinks  are  diversely  presented  unto 
me  as  from  a  common  theatre  or  scene.  I  hear  new  news  every  day,  and 
those  ordinary  rumours  of  war,  plagues,  fires,  inundations,  thefts,  murders, 
massacres,  meteors,  comets,  spectrums,  prodigies,  apparitions,  of  towns  taken, 
cities  besieged  in  France,  Germany,  Turkey,  Persia,  Poland,  &c.,  daily  mus- 
ters and  preparations  and  suchlike,  which  these  tempestuous  times  afford, 
battles  fought,  so  many  men  slain,  monomachies,  shipwrecks,"  &e. 

The  enumeration  would  stretch  on  through  one  of  our  pages. 
To  the  modern  writer  Burton  is  of  use  only  as  a  quarry,  and  to 
this  purpose  he  has  been  turned  by  many.  Sterne  is  not  the  only 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  263 

writer  that  has  used  the  '  Anatomy  of  Melancholy  '  as  raw  material. 
The  passage  we  have  quoted  is  probably  the  germ  of  Steele  and 
Addison's  '  Spectator.' 

Nathaniel  Butter,  bookseller  and  pamphleteer,  is  a  personage 
of  some  importance,  as  being  the  father  of  newspapers.  It  used 
to  be  supposed  that  the  '  English  Mercury'  of  1588  was  the  first 
of  English  printed  newspapers,  but  it  is  proved  to  have  been  a 
forgery  of  later  date.  During  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  annual  sum- 
maries of  the  chief  events  upon  the  Continent  were  printed  under 
the  title  of  '  Gallo-Belgici.'  The  proceedings  of  Continental  powers 
were  always  interesting,  and  letters  from  friends  in  London  con- 
taining the  latest  news  were  eagerly  passed  from  hand  to  hand. 
When  the  Thirty  Years'  War  broke  out,  this  interest  may  be  sup- 
posed to  have  greatly  increased  ;  and  express  news-letters,  written 
by  booksellers  and  others  to  their  customers  in  the  provinces,  were 
much  in  request.  These  occasional  productions  may  sometimes 
have  been  printed.  Butter  is  the  first  known  author  of  a  regular 
series  of  such  printed  papers  of  news;  in  1622  he  began  the 
'  Weekly  News,'  which  he  "  purposed  to  continue  weekly  by  God's 
assistance,  from  the  best  and  most  certain  intelligence."  "Who- 
soever," he  said,  "  will  be  cunning  in  the  places  and  persons  of 
Germany,  and  understand  her  wars,  let  him  not  despise  my  Goran- 
toes."  His  "  corantoes,"  or  courants,  however,  were  despised,  and 
that  intensely,  by  the  wits  of  the  period.  There  may  have  been 
no  guile  in  Nathaniel  himself,  but  his  imitators  and  rivals,  who 
soon  became  numerous,  seem  to  have  published  letters  from  "  an 
eminent  Jew  merchant  in  Germany,"  and  other  correspondents  of 
doubtful  authenticity.  And  Ben  Jonson  did  not  scruple  to  declare 
that  their  pamphlets  of  news  were  "  made  all  at  home,  and  no 
syllable  of  truth  in  them."  The  unfortunate  name  of  Butter  made 
him  an  inviting  butt  Jonson  called  him  the  "butter-box,"  de- 
scribed his  news  as  "  rank  Irish  butter  " ;  and  Fletcher  made  one 
of  his  characters  say  that  "  the  spirit  of  Butter  shall  look  as  if 
butter  would  not  melt  in  his  mouth."  The  hostility  of  the  stage 
may  have  been  partly  roused  by  the  dramatic  criticisms  of  these 
embryonic  journalists.  Despite  his  name,  Butter  seems  to  have 
been  an  industrious  and  veracious  man,  and  not  by  any  means  the 
fantastic  liar  that  has  been  represented  by  the  dramatists.1 

»  See  Cornhill  Magazine,  July  1868. 


CHAPTER    IV. 


FROM    1640   TO    1670. 


THOMAS      FTJLIiEB, 

1608 — 1661. 

IK  the  exciting  days  of  the  first  Charles  and  of  the  Common- 
wealth, the  life  even  of  a  clergyman  was  subject  to  danger  and 
adventure,  if  he  happened  to  be  a  partisan.  Fuller,  the  son  of 
the  Rector  of  All  Winkle,  in  Northamptonshire,  bred  up  in  the 
usual  course  of  school  and  college  education,  and  appointed  pre- 
bend of  Salisbury  and  vicar  of  Broad  Windsor  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
three,  spent  the  first  thirty-three  years  of  his  life  in  the  greatest 
imaginable  freedom  from  care.  Up  to  1640  he  was  unmolested  in 
his  quiet  existence — varying  his  parish  duties  with  the  literary 
plans  that  served  to  fill  his  hours  of  leisure.  But  by  1640  the 
political  atmosphere  became  troubled ;  and  Fuller  was  called  from 
his  retreat  to  uphold  in  the  pulpits  of  the  metropolis  the  duty  of 
obedience  to  the  King.  He  spent  a  year  with  the  royal  forces  in 
the  character  of  chaplain  to  Lord  Hopton.  Growing  weary  of  this 
irregular  life,  in  1644  he  withdrew  to  Exeter,  and  busied  himself 
with  his  compositions.  On  the  capitulation  of  Exeter,  he  removed 
to  London.  In  1655  he  received  from  the  Protector  special  per- 
mission to  preach.  He  lived  to  see  the  Restoration,  but  did  not 
long  enjoy  the  reward  given  to  his  loyalty,  dying  on  the  I5th  of 
August  1 66 1. 

His  '  Holy  War,'  the  first  of  his  works,  was  written  in  the  quiet 
of  the  parsonage  at  Broad  Windsor.     His  other  works l  he  com- 

1  The  list  of  his  principal  works  is  as  follow :  '  History  of  the  Holy  War,' 
1640;  'Tl ie  Holy  State,' 1642  ;  'Good  Thought*  in  Had  Times,"  1644-45  ;  'The 
Profane  Mute,'  1648  ;  'Good  Thoughts  ill  Worse  Times,'  1649;  'A  Pi.sgtli  Sight 


THOMAS   FULLER.  265 

posed  when  his  life  was  more  unsettled ;  though  during  the  excite- 
ment of  the  Civil  War  his  energies  were  so  far  from  being  absorbed 
in  the  struggle,  that  he  was  quietly  occupied  in  collecting  materials 
for  his  '  Worthies,'  and  in  laying  up  a  heterogeneous  store  of 
anecdotes. 

In  person1  Fuller  seems  to  have  been  rather  over  the  middle 
height,  full-bodied,  with  light  curling  hair,  florid  complexion,  and 
clear  blue  eyes.  He  had  an  erect  easy  carriage,  as  was  natural  in 
a  man  of  confident  good  spirits.  He  was  careless  in  his  dress. 

He  had  an  astonishing  memory.  The  anecdotes  of  his  powers 
are  probably,  like  all  anecdotes  of  the  kind,  not  a  little  over- 
coloured  ;  still  they  show  what  an  impression  he  made  on  those 
that  knew  him.  "  It  is  said  that  he  could  repeat  five  hundred 
strange  words  after  twice  hearing,  and  could  make  use  of  a  sermon 
verbatim  if  he  once  heard  it  He  undertook  once,  in  passing  to 
and  fro  from  Temple  Bar  to  the  furthest  point  of  Cheapside,  to  tell 
at  his  return  every  sign  as  it  stood  in  order  on  both  sides  of  the 
way,  repeating  them  either  backwards  or  forwards ;  and  he  did  it 
exactly."  His  quickness  in  discovering  resemblance  was  no  less 
remarkable.  This  power,  however,  was  not  exercised  on  subjects 
that  test  intellectual  strength ;  he  did  not  strain  his  intellect  like 
a  great  rhetorician  to  find  telling  arguments,  nor  like  a  great  poet 
to  find  harmonious  images.  He  wandered  at  will  over  the  great 
stores  accumulated  by  his  memory,  and  amused  himself  in  picking 
out  incongruities,  playing  upon  names,  making  odd  comparisons, 
and  suchlike  ingenious  freaks. 

The  chief  destination  of  his  scholarship  is  to  tickle  the  sense  of 
the  ludicrous ;  no  writer  in  our  literature,  except  perhaps  Burton, 
applies  so  much  scholarship  to  so  singular  a  purpose.  "Wit," 
Coleridge  said,  "was  the  stuff  and  substance  of  Fuller's  intellect." 

His  outward  appearance  was,  to  use  a  phrase  of  his  own,  "  hung 
out  as  a  sign  "  of  his  disposition ;  the  cheerful,  careless,  confident 
nature  of  the  man  was  legible  in  his  countenance.  Though  he 
lived  in  times  of  fierce  excitement,  and  was  violently  thrust  out 
from  his  quiet  home  by  the  Puritans,  and  not  permitted  to  take 
even  his  books  with  him,  yet  he  shows  no  stronger  feeling  towards 
the  triumphant  party  than  sly  humorous  ridicule  of  individual 
sectaries.  His  attachment  to  his  friends  was  equally  moderate ; 
he  probably  had  a  bias  for  the  Church  of  England,  but  he  does 

of  Palestine,'  1650;  'Abel  Redivivus*  (a  Martyrology),  1651 ;  'Church  History 
of  Britain,'  1656 ;  '  Mixed  Contemplations  in  Better  Times,'  1660  ;  '  Worthies  of 
England'  (posthumous),  1662.  Fuller  may  be  said  to  have  been  the  first  "  writer 
of  books  "  by  profession.  He  acknowledges  that  one  of  his  objects  in  writing 
was — "  to  get  some  honest  profit  to  himself." 

1  It  is  difficult  to  make  out  the  personal  appearance  of  some  eminent  English 
divines.  Even  their  good  looks  are  overrated  by  one  party  and  underrated  by 
another. 


266  FKOM   1640  TO   1670. 

not  uphold  the  fame  of  her  champions  with  anything  approaching 
jealous  impatience  of  contradiction.  His  eye  seems  to  have  been 
ever  open  to  the  comic  aspects  both  of  friend  and  of  foe.  He 
made  a  habit  of  looking  at  the  world  through  a  humorous  me- 
dium. He  conveys  abundance  of  solid  information,  but  his  infor- 
mation has  the  oddest  possible  frame  of  witty  nonsense. 

Confident  and  careless — careless  in  the  sense  of  rising  humor- 
ously superior  to  care — Fuller  was  not  an  idle  man,  disposed,  like 
one  of  Charles  Lamb's  genial  borrowing  fellows,  to  live  upon  the 
generosity  of  his  friends.  He  took  no  earnest  part  in  the  fierce 
contest  of  his  times,  but  the  list  of  his  works  is  ample  proof  of  his 
capacity  for  honest  industry.  He  puts  comical  wrappages  about 
his  information,  but  it  is  unimpeachably  substantial,  and  could  not 
have  been  procured  without  steady  application. 

He  was  born  a  Churchman,  and  continued  a  Churchman ;  yet  so 
moderate  were  his  sentiments,  that  he  was  suspected  of  a  leaning 
to  Puritanism.  Before  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  he  preached 
in  London,  and  offended  the  party  of  the  Parliament  by  advising 
submission  to  royal  authority.  When  the  rupture  came,  he  fled  to 
the  king  at  Oxford,  and  there  offended  the  royalists  by  advising 
conciliation. 

ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE, 

Vocabulary. — A  good  many  archaisms  occur  in  Fuller,  though 
upon  the  whole  he  writes  with  a  more  modern  phrase  than  any 
clergyman  and  scholar  of  the  time.  In  his  easy  manner  he  would 
probably  use  the  first  word  that  came  to  hand.  We  meet  with 
such  obsolete  words  as  "  authenticalness,"  "  cowardness  "  (coward- 
liness), "  diurnal "  (journal),  "  extempory  "  (extemporary),  "  dunci- 
cal"  (stupid),  "jocularly"  (jocular),  "farced"  (stu/ed),  "misoclere" 
(hater  of  the  clergy),  "  un-understood,"  "  volant  "  (volatile).  Such 
of  his  words  as  "  minutary  "  (analogous  to  momentary),  and  "  order- 
able,"  in  the  sense  of  submissive  to  orders,  might  with  advantage 
have  passed  into  general  use. 

In  Fuller's  time  English  had  not  yet  settled  down  to  the  present 
form  of  inflections.  He  is  not  at  all  uniform  in  his  mode  of  in- 
flecting— sometimes  he  uses  the  modern  forms,  sometimes  there 
stray  across  his  page  such  forms  as  "  took  "  for  taken,  "  bleeded  " 
(bled),  "  understanden,"  "  understanded  "  (understood),  "  strick," 
"  stroke,"  "  strook  "  (struck),  "  sprongen  "  (sprung),  "  sungen  " 
(sung).  Sometimes  he  uses  "  his  "  instead  of  the  possessive  affix, 
"  King  James  his  reign."  On  one  occasion  he  gives  whole  a  com- 
parative "  wholler." 

He  mingled  so  much  with  the  world,  holding  intercourse  with 
all  classes,  and  being  a  good  listener  to  every  form  of  garrulity, 


THOMAS   FULLER.  267 

that  he  uses  a  larger  admixture  of  Saxon  than  his  more  recluse 
contemporaries.  Besides,  as  we  shall  see,  the  use  of  very  homely 
words  is  one  of  his  instruments  of  ridicule. 

Sentences. — His  sentences  are  not  involved  and  intricate;  In 
this  respect  he  is  much  superior  to  Hooker,  Taylor,  or  any  theo- 
logical writer  of  his  time.  The  following,  in  his  Church  History, 
on  the  plan  taken  by  James  L  to  reduce  the  power  of  the  English 
nobility,  is  rather  an  exception  ;  he  has  comparatively  few  so  loose 
and  involved  as  this  : — 

"  But  following  the  counsel  of  his  English  secretary  there  present,  he 
soon  found  a  way  to  abate  the  formidable  greatness  of  the  English  nobility, 
by  conferring  honour  upon  many  persons  ;  whereby  nobility  was  spread  so 
broad,  that  it  became  very  thin,  which  much  lessened  the  ancient  esteem 
thereof." 

It  must  be  allowed,  however,  that  in  a  full  statement,  or  in  an 
argument  pursued  at  any  length,  he  is  not  so  much  more  skilled 
in  avoiding  intricacies  than  his  contemporaries.  He  is  orderly 
chiefly  because  he  is  brief — usually  trying  to  despatch  a  statement 
of  fact  or  an  argument  as  succinctly  as  possible.  He  is  seldom 
drawn  into  complicated  statements  by  a  desire  of  saying  too  much. 

That  he  studied  expressly  to  avoid  the  cumbrous  effect  of  for- 
mally indicating  connection  and  dependence,  may  be  inferred  from 
his  Prefaces,  where  he  is  put  upon  his  mettle,  and  writes  with 
more  care.  Thus — 

"  Seamen  observe,  that  the  water  is  the  more  troubled  the  nearer  they 
draw  on  to  the  land,  because  broken  by  repercussion  from  the  shore.  I  am 
sensible  of  the  same  danger,  the  nearer  I  approach  our  times,  and  the  end  of 
this  History. " 

Most  writers  before  the  Restoration  would  have  thrown  these 
two  sentences  into  one. 

He  is  a  great  master  of  short  pointed  sentences.  His  pages  are 
strewn  with  pithy  sayings,  that  stick  in  the  mind  like  proverbs. 
Almost  every  paragraph  is  preceded  by  a  short  sentence  giving  the 
pith  of  the  whole.  Thus  in  his  Essay  on  Tombs,  he  has  the  follow- 
ing aphorisms :  "  Tombs  are  the  clothes  of  the  dead.  A  grave  is 
but  a  plain  suit,  and  a  rich  monument  is  one  embroidered." 
"  Tombs  ought  in  some  sort  to  be  proportioned,  not  to  the  wealth, 
but  deserts  of  the  party  interred."  "  The  shortest,  plainest,  and 
truest  epitaphs  are  the  best."  "  To  want  a  grave  is  the  cruelty 
of  the  living,  not  the  misery  of  the  dead."  "  A  good  memory  is 
the  best  monument." 

Paragraphs. — He  often  digresses  to  tell  an  anecdote,  but  is  sen- 
sible of  his  digression.  Sometimes  he  apologises,  and  tries  to 
make  out  a  connection ;  at  other  times  he  throws  himself  on  the 
reader's  forbearance.  Thus — "  Reader,  whether  smiling  or  frown- 
ing, forgive  the  digression." 


2fi8  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

But  there  is  this  to  be  said  for  Fuller's  digressions,  they  never 
confuse.  He  lightens  his  subject  by  numerous  paragraph  breaks, 
made  with  considerable  though  not  perfect  accuracy,  and — which 
is  his  main  preventive  of  confusion  —  with  every  considerable 
change  of  subject,  he  gives  a  summary  italic  heading,  and  makes  a 
fresh  start 

Figures  of  Speech, — His  style  is  thickly  interspersed  with  in- 
genious similitudes.  "  The  chief  diseases  of  the  fancy,"  he  says 
himself,  "are  either  that  it  is  too  wild  and  high-soaring,  or  else 
too  low  and  grovelling,  or  else  too  desultory  and  over-voluble." 
The  last  is  his  own  "  disease."  Ingenious  as  is  the  play  of  his 
fancy,  it  is  much  more  luxuriant  than  would  be  tolerated  now,  and 
did  not  escape  censure  even  in  his  own  day. 

His  figures,  like  Bacon's,  are  taken  largely  from  his  own  obser- 
vations of  common  life — only,  unlike  Bacon's,  they  are  nearly  all, 
in  accordance  with  the  author's  ruling  tendency,  calculated  to 
make  the  reader  laugh  or  smile.  So  far  from  exalting  the  object 
they  are  applied  to,  their  purpose  is  to  set  it  in  a  whimsical  light ; 
the  most  serious  subjects  are  set  off  with  odd  similitudes,  and  the 
reader  is  tempted  to  laugh  where  propriety  requires  him  to  be 
grave.  The  following  are  one  or  two  examples.  Of  the  good 
bishop,  he  says  : — 

"He  is  careful  and  happy  in  suppressing  of  heresies  and  schisms.  He 
distinguisheth  of  schismatics  as  physicians  do  of  leprous  people  :  some  are 
infectious,  others  not ;  some  are  active  to  seduce  others,  others  quietly  enjoy 
their  opinions  in  their  own  consciences.  .  .  .  To  use  force  before  people 
are  fairly  taught  the  truth,  is  to  knock  a  nail  into  a  board  without  wimbling 
a  hole  lor  it,  which  then  either  not  enters,  or  turns  crooked,  or  splits  the 
wood  it  pierceth." 

Again — 

' '  Let  us  be  careful  to  provide  rest  for  our  souls,  and  our  bodies  will  pro- 
ride  rest  for  themselves.  And  let  us  not  be  herein  like  unto  gentlewomen, 
who  care  not  to  keep  the  inside  of  the  orange,  but  candy  and  preserve  only 
the  outside. " 

And,  condemning  the  use  of  high-flown  language  with  inferior 
matter,  he  says — 

'Some  men's  speeches  are  like  the  high  mountains  in  Ireland,  having  a 
dirty  bog  in  the  top  of  them. " 

He  advises  the  young  writer  to  take  advice  of  a  faithful 
friend : — 

"  When  thou  pennest  an  oration,  let  him  have  the  power  of  the  '  Indez 
Expurgatorius '  to  expunge  what  he  pleaseth  ;  and  do  not  thou,  like  a  fond 
mother,  cry  if  the  child  of  thy  brain  be  corrected  for  playing  the  war  ton." 

Fuller  himself  "  plays  the  wanton  "  in  similitudes  so  often  that 
we  see  a  touch  of  the  ludicrous  in  nearly  every  comparison  that  he 


THOMAS   FULLER.  269 

makes,  just  as  in  conversation  we  are  tickled  by  every  word  that 
falls  from  an  acknowledged  wit. 

A  great  many  of  his  comparisons  are  historical  parallels,  or 
ingenious  figurative  applications  of  historical  facts.  The  following 
is  an  instance.  Writing  of  one  of  his  worthies,  he  says : — 

"  He  obtained  a  plentiful  estate,  and  thereof  gave  wellnigh  three  thousand 
pounds  to  Sidney  College.  Now  as  it  is  reported  of  Ulysses,  returning  from 
his  long  travel  in  foreign  lands,  that  all  his  family  had  forgot  him  ;  so  when 
the  news  of  this  legacy  first  arrived  at  the  College,  none  then  extant  therein 
ever  heard  of  his  name  (so  much  may  the  sponge  of  forty  years  blot  out  in 
this  kind) ;  only  the  written  register  of  the  College  faithfully  retained  his 
name  therein. 

"This  his  gift  was  a  gift  ndeed,  purely  bestowed  on  the  College,  as 
loaded  with  no  detrimental  conditions,  in  the  acceptance  thereof.  We  read 
in  the  Prophet,  '  Thou  hast  increased  the  nation,  and  not  multiplied  their 
joy.'  In  proportion  whereunto,  we  know  it  is  possible  that  the  comfortable 
condition  of  a  College  may  not  be  increased,  though  the  number  of  the 
fellows  and  scholars  therein  be  augmented,  superadded  branches  sucking  out 
the  sap  of  the  root ;  whereas  the  legacy  of  this  worthy  knight ponebatur  in 
lucro,  being  pure  gain  and  improvement  to  the  College. " 

Here  we  see  the  same  whimsical  vein,  the  same  tendency  to  make 
ludicrous  comparisons  of  small  things  with  great,  and  great  things 
with  small.  The  following,  from  his  '  Mixt  Contemplations,'  is  a 
sample  of  his  elaborate  similitudes ;  it  also  illustrates  the  ludicrous 
meanness  of  comparison  that  grave  divines  have  pronounced  un- 
pardonable levity : — 

"  I  have  observed  that  children  when  they  first  put  on  new  shoes,  are  very 
curious  to  keep  them  clean.  Scarce  will  they  set  their  feet  on  the  ground 
for  fear  to  dirt  the  soles  of  their  shoes.  Yea,  rather  they  will  wipe  the 
leather  clean  with  their  coats  ;  and  yet,  perchance,  the  next  day  they  will 
trample  with  the  same  shoes  in  the  mire  up  to  the  ankles.  Alas,  children's 
play  is  our  earnest !  On  that  day  wherein  we  receive  the  sacrament,  we  are 
often  over-precise,  scrupling  to  say  or  do  those  things  which  lawfully  we 
may.  But  we,  who  are  more  than  curious  that  day,  are  not  so  much  as  care- 
fulthe  next;  and  too  often  (what  shall  I  say  I)  go  on  in  sin  up  to  the  ankles: 
yea,  our  sins  go  over  our  heads." 

While  the  great  majority  of  Fuller's  similitudes  have  a  whimsical 
turn,  he  often  employs  them  to  convey  sound  practical  advice. 
Thus— 

"Parents  who  cross  the  current  of  their  children's  genius  (if  running  in 
no  vicious  channels),  tempt  them  to  take  worse  courses  themselves." 

QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — The  drawback  to  Fuller's  simplicity  is  the  vice  of 
his  age — the  parade  of  learned  terms  and  unnecessary  allusions. 
Expressions  are  quoted  with  chapter  and  verse  when  the  quotation 
serves  no  purpose  of  illustration,  and  can  excite  in  the  reader  only 


270  FROM   1640   TO   1670. 

a  pedantic  pleasure  that  he  has  seen  it  before,  or  a  whimsical 
surprise  at  seeing  brought  together  two  cases  that  have  no  material 
resemblance.  It  is,  however,  but  just  to  say  that  he  is  much  less 
pedantic  than  Taylor  or  Browne,  and  immeasurably  less  so  than 
Burton.  Only  now  and  then  do  we  come  across  such  a  passage  as 
occurs  in  the  following  Dedication  to  Douse  Fuller : — 

"  I  cannot  say  certainly  of  you,  as  Naomi  did  of  Boaz,  *  He  is  near  of  kin 
unto  us,'  Ruth  ii.  20 ;  having  no  assurance,  though  great  probability,  of 
alliance  unto  you.  However,  sir,  if  you  shall  be  pleased  in  courtesy  to 
account  me  your  kinsman,  I  will  endeavour  that  (as  it  will  be  an  honour  to 
me)  it  may  be  to  you  no  disgrace." 

Or  such  as  the  following,  where  the  homeliest  Saxon  rubs  shoulders 
with  canonical  Latin  : — 

"First,  soundly  infix  in  thy  mind  what  thou  desirest  to  remember.  What, 
wonder  is  it  if  agitation  of  business  jog  that  out  of  thy  head  which  was  there 
tacked  rather  than  fastened  ?  whereas  those  notions  which  get  in  by  videnta 
possessio,  will  abide  there  till  ejectio  firma,  sickness,  or  extreme  age,  dispos- 
sess them.  It  is  best  knocking  in  the  nail  over-night,  and  clinching  it  in 
the  next  morning." 

Perspicuity. — One  thing  that  helps  largely  to  make  Fuller's 
style  so  remarkably  easy  reading  is  his  perspicuous  arrangement 
"  Method,"  he  says  himself,  "  is  the  mother  of  memory."  In  all 
his  works  he  follows  a  simple  plan  :  there  is  consequently  no  con- 
fusion, no  perplexity ;  we  are  not  irritated  by  searching  for  a  fact, 
and  finding  it  out  of  its  proper  connection ;  we  can  find  what  we 
want  in  a  moment.  Take,  for  instance,  his  '  Worthies.'  He  there 
gives  an  account  of  the  notabilities  of  England  county  by  county, 
proceeding  in  each  county  after  a  fixed  order,  which  he  explains  at 
the  beginning  of  the  book.  How  highly  he  valued  the  principle 
of  order  appears  in  his  anxiety  to  show  how  well  he  had  observed 
it.  In  an  introductory  chapter  designed  to  anticipate  objections  to 
the  "  style  and  matter  of  the  author,"  divided  into  heads  and  num- 
bered, as  is  his  manner  with  every  subject,  he  supposes  "  Exception 
1 6  "  to  be  as  follows : — 

"  You  lay  down  certain  rules  for  the  better  regulating  your  work,  and 
directing  the  reader,  promising  to  confine  yourself  to  the  observation  thereof, 
and  break  them  often  yourself.  For  instance,  you  restrain  the  topic  of 
lawyers  to  capital  judges  and  writers  of  the  law  ;  yet  under  that  head  insert 
Judge  Paston  and  others,  who  were  only  puny  judges  in  their  respective 
courts.  .  .  .  Why  did  you  break  such  rules,  when  knowing  you  made 
them  ?  Why  did  yon  make  such  rules,  when  minding  to  break  them  ? " 

To  this  he  returns  the  following — 

"Answer. — 1  never  intended  to  tie  myself  up  so  close,  without  reserving 
lawful  liberty  to  myself  upon  just  oo.-asion.  .  .  .  I  resolved  to  keep  the 
key  in  my  own  hamls,  to  enlarge  myself  when  I  apprehended  a  just  cause 
thereof.  However,  I  have  iiot  made  use  of  this  key  to  recede  from  my  first 


THOMAS   FULLER.  271 

limitations,  save  where  I  crave  leave  of  and  render  a  reason  to  the  reader  ; 
such  anomalous  persons  being  men  of  high  merit,  under  those  heads  where 
they  are  inserted." 

In  giving  an  account  of  arguments,  he  states  the  two  sides  separ- 
ately, often  printing  them  in  parallel  columns.  The  reasonings  of 
opposite  parties  in  the  Church  are  exhibited  on  this  handy  method. 
80  when  he  argues  himself,  he  analyses  the  positions  of  his  adver- 
sary, and  replies  to  them  one  by  one,  numbering  each  position,  and 
labelling  the  argument  and  the  answer  with  an  italic  heading  to 
prevent  every  possibility  of  confusion,  and  to  let  the  reader  know 
where  he  is  at  a  glance. 

The  '  Holy  State '  and  the  c  Profane  State '  are  models  of  simple 
arrangement.  In  the  '  Holy  State '  he  describes  a  number  of  good 
characters,  first  an  ideal  unfolded  in  a  number  of  maxims,  then  an 
example  to  correspond.  Thus,  for  "  the  good  servant "  he  lays 
down  seven  maxims — "(i)  He  doth  not  dispute  his  master's  will, 
but  doth  it ; "  "  (2)  He  loves  to  go  about  his  business  with  cheer- 
fulness ; "  "  (3)  He  despatches  his  business  with  quickness  and  ex- 
pedition," and  so  on.  This  is  followed  up  by  the  life  of  Eliezer, 
the  steward  of  Abraham's  household.  The  '  Profane  State'  is  the 
counterpart  of  the  '  Holy  State,'  dealing  with  bad  characters,  the 
Harlot,  the  Heretic,  the  Traitor,  &c.  One  of  the  books  of  the 
'  Holy  State '  deals  with  virtues  and  vices  in  the  abstract,  plenti- 
fully illustrated  and  embellished  with  anecdotes  and  fancies. 

Strength — Under  this  head  little  need  be  said  of  Fuller.  His 
style  has  the  vigour  of  brief  statement  and  well-chosen  words  ;  but 
he  never  attempts  to  soar,  and  when  he  does,  is  soon  tempted  back 
to  his  homely  level  by  some  oddity  of  comparison. 

Brevity  is  a  very  conspicuous  feature  in  his  style.  In  none  of 
Fuller's  works  could  we  read  three  sentences  on  end  without  being 
reminded  of  the  saying  that  "Brevity  is  the  soul  of  wit." 

Pathos,  —  His  genius  was  more  inclined  to  pathos  than  to 
strength :  but  his  expression  of  tenderness  is  seldom  direct ;  it  is 
to  be  found  in  the  disguise  of  humour,  lurking  in  some  droll  con- 
ceit. There  is  a  quaint  kindliness  in  his  conclusion  of  the  '  Life 
of  Philemon  Holland,'  the  translator  of  Camden's  'Britannia.' 
"  This  venerable  translator  was  translated  to  heaven  in  the  year 
16— ." 

But  how  little  he  could  resist  the  attraction  of  comical  allusions, 
even  in  the  most  pitiful  circumstances,  is  seen  in  his  account  of  an 
accident  that  happened  to  a  Catholic  congregation  : — 

"The  sermon  began  to  incline  to  the  middle,  the  day  to  the  end  thereof; 
when  on  a  sudden  the  floor  fell  down  whereon  they  were  assembled.  It  gave 
no  charitable  warning  groan  beforehand,  but  cracked, 'broke,  and  fell,  all  in 
an  instant  Many  were  killed,  more  bruised,  all  frighted.  Sad  sight,  to 
behold  the  flesh  and  blood  of  different  persons  mingled  together,  aud  the 


272  FROM  1640  TO   1670. 

brains  of  one  on  the  head  of  another  !  One  lacked  a  leg  ;  another  an  arm  ; 
a  third  whole  and  entire,  wanting  nothing  but  breath,  stifled  in  the  rains."" 

As  we  noted  in  the  case  of  Macaulay,  his  interest  in  unimport- 
ant facts  overbears  his  interest  in  the  tragic  aspects  of  a  scene. 
His  account  of  the  death  of  Charles  is  very  matter-of-fact,  and 
shows  the  antiquary  predominating  over  the  man.  True,  one  or 
two  of  the  facts  are  suggestive.  Even  the  conclusion,  the  most 
dryasdust  of  the  whole,  will  set  some  on  the  track  of  a  reflection 
or  a  moral : — 

"  On  the  Wednesday  se'nnight  after,  (February  7th),  his  corpse,  em- 
balmed  and  coffined  in  lead,  was  delivered  to  the  care  of  two  of  his 
servants,  to  be  buried  in  Windsor;  the  one  Anthony  Mildmay,  who  for- 
merly had  been  his  sewer,  as  I  take  it ;  the  other  John  Joyner,  bred  first 
in  his  Majesty's  kitchen,  afterwards  a  parliament-captain,  since  by  them 
deputed  (when  the  Scots  surrendered  his  person)  cook  to  his  Majesty. 
This  night  they  brought  the  corpse  to  Windsor,  and  digged  a  grave  for  it  in 
St  Georgers  Chapel,  on  the  south  side  of  the  communion-table." 

But  certainly  there  is  no  superfluous  sentiment  on  the  part  of  the 
author.  It  might,  indeed,  have  been  dangerous  to  moralise  under 
the  circumstances ;  we  could,  however,  have  dispensed  with  the 
gossip  about  his  Majesty's  cook. 

Wit  and  Humour. — The  chief  part  of  our  author's  reputation  is 
based  on  his  wit  A  pleasant  vein  runs  through  everything  he 
wrote,  no  matter  what  the  subject,  dignified  or  undignified,  grave 
or  gay.  His  very  sermons  are  full  of  the  same  quaint  humour. 
By  some  of  his  contemporaries,  as  we  have  said,  he  was  frowned 
upon  for  treating  solemn  things  in  a  tone  of  levity ;  but  there  is 
no  better  evidence  of  the  power  of  wit  to  disarm  resentment  than 
the  fact  remarked  by  his  recent  editor,  that  Fuller  "  was  permitted 
to  give  utterance  to  some  strong  sentiments,  which  less  favoured 
individuals  durst  scarcely  own  to  have  found  a  lodgment  within 
their  breasts." 

His  wit  is  genial  and  good-natured ;  sometimes  he  burlesques 
the  conduct  of  a  sectary  with  considerable  rudeness ;  but  in  general 
his  laugh  is  kindly. 

Nearly  all  Barrow's  varieties  of  wit  might  be  illustrated  copi- 
ously from  Fuller ;  indeed,  he  may  have  written  his  remarks  on 
wit  with  Fuller's  pages  open  before  him.  We  have  seen  examples 
of  the  "  odd  similitude  "  and  the  "  pat  allusion  to  a  known  story." 
The  "seasonable  application  of  sayings,"  and  the  "forging  of 
apposite  tales,"  are  of  the  same  kind,  and  need  not  be  farther 
illustrated.  A  large  part  of  the  wit  consists  in  "  playing  in  words 
and  phrases,  taking  advantage  from  the  ambiguity  of  their  sense 
or  the  affinity  of  their  sound."  Laud  is  "a  man  of  low  stature, 
but  of  high  parts  ; "  I)r  Field  is  "  that  learned  divine  whoso 
memory  smelleth  like  a  Field  the  Lord  hath  blessed ; "  Nicholas 


THOMAS   FULLER.  273 

Sanders,  being  an  enemy  of  tlie  Church,  is  "more  truly  Slanders." 
Fuller  never  misses  an  opportunity  of  punning.  Sometimes  the 
puns  are  very  elaborate,  as  in  the  following.  Take  first  the 
seventh  item  in  the  character  of  the  good  widow : — 

"If  she  speaks  little  good  of  him"  (her  dead  husband)  "she  speaks  but 
little  of  him.  So  handsomely  folding  up  her  discourse,  that  his  virtues  are 
shown  outwards,  and  his  vices  wrajit  up  in  silence  ;  as  counting  it  barbarism 
to  throw  dirt  on  his  memory  who  hath  moulds  cast  on  his  body." 

Take  next  an  item  in  the  character  of  the  good  master : — 

"  The  wages  he  contracts  for  he  duly  and  truly  pays  to  his  servants.  The 
same  word  in  the  Greek,  Us,  signifies  '  rust '  and  '  poison ' ;  and  some 
strong  poison  is  made  of  the  rust  of  metals  ;  but  none  more  venomous  tlism 
the  rust  of  money  in  the  rich  man's  purse  unjustly  detained  from  the 
labourer,  which  will  poison  and  infect  his  whole  estate." 

He  is  fond  of  constructing  opportunities  for  droll  rejoinders. 
In  the  introductory  chapters  to  his  '  Worthies,'  already  mentioned, 
he  imagines  and  deals  as  follows  with — 

"  Exception  9. — '  Haste  makes  waste.'  You  have  huddled  your  book  too 
soon  to  the  press,  for  a  subject  of  such  a  nature.  .  .  . 


-K 'onumque  preinatur  in  annum. 


"  Eight  years  digest  what  you  have  rudely  hinted, 
And  in  the  ninth  year  let  the  same  be  printed. 

"Answer. — That  ninth  year  might  happen  eight  years  after  my  death, 
&c. 

The  following  is  an  unexpectedly  conclusive  evidence.  By 
the  beginning  one  is  prepared  only  for  some  slight  doubt  of  the 
suspicion : — 

"The  suspicion  of  making  it"  (something  in  the  way  of  Church  con- 
troversy) "  fell  on  Gregory  Martin  :  one  probable  enough  for  such  a  prank 
(as  being  Divinity  Professor  at  Rheim.s)  did  not  his  epitaph  there  ensure  me 
he  was  dead  and  buried  two  years  before." 

In  the  following  he  whimsically  imagines,  and  objects  to  a 
strictness  of  literal  interpretation  that  few  would  think  of  con- 
tending for : — 

"  St  Paul  saith,  '  Let  not  the  sun  go  down  on  your  wrath,'  to  carry  news 
to  the  antipodes  in  another  world  of  thy  revengeful  nature.  Yet  let  us 
take  the  apostle's  meaning  rather  than  his  words,  with  all  possible  speed  to 
dispose  our  passions  ;  not  understanding  him  so  literally  that  we  may  take 
leave  to  be  angry  till  sunset ;  then  mi^ht  our  wrath  lengthen  with  the  days, 
»nd  men  in  Greenland,  where  day  lasts  above  a  quarter  of  a  year,  have 
plentiful  scope  of  revenge." 

Wit  is  not  the  only  comical  seasoning  of  Fuller's  amusing  pro- 
ductions. Throughout  his  '  Church  History '  and  his  '  Worthies,' 
we  are  kept  in  a  perpetual  suiiie  by  the  purposely  undignified 
familiarity  of  his  language.  Sometimes  this  becomes  open 

s 


274  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

burlesque,    as   in   his    account   of    Brown,   the   founder  of    the 
"  Brownists  "  : — 

"  Some  years  after  Brown  went  over  into  Zealand,  to  purchase  himself 
more  reputation  from  foreign  parts.  For  a  smack  of  travel  gives  a  high 
taste  to  strange  opinions,  making  them  better  relish  to  the  licorish  lovers 
of  novelty.  Home  he  returns  with  a  full  cry  against  the  Church  of  England, 
as,  having  so  much  of  Koine,  she  had  nothing  of  Christ  in  her  discipline. 
Norfolk  was  the  first  place  whereon  Brown  (new-flown  home  out  of  the  Low 
Countries)  perched  himself,  and  therein,"  &c. 

As  another  instance  of  this,  note  how  he  speaks  of  the  Round 
Table  legends : — 

"  As  for  his  Round  Table,  with  his  knights  about  it,  the  tale  whereof  hath 
trundled  so  smoothly  along  for  many  ages,  it  never  met  with  much  belief 
among  the  judicious." 

The  strict  method  of  his  works,  so  far  from  being  a  shackle  to 
his  wit,  furnishes  him  with  additional  opportunities  for  quaint 
turns.  Thus  he  concludes  his  account  of  Brown  by  saying : — 

"Thus  to  make  our  story  of  the  troublesome  man  the  more  entire,  we 
have  trespassed  on  the  two  following  years,  yet  without  discomposing  our 
chronology  in  the  margin." 

Again,  writing  of  Bishop  Barnes  and  Bernard  Gil  pin,  he  says : — 

"Seeing  they  were  loving  in  their  lives,  in  my  book  their  memories 
shall  not  be  divided,  though  I  confess  the  latter  died  some  three  years 
before." 

No  other  quality  of  Fuller's  style  calls  for  special  illustration. 
Brevity,  point,  simplicity,  and  wit,  are  his  conspicuous  character- 
istics. In  the  examples  quoted,  the  reader  will  have  noticed  that 
he  is  fond  of  alliteration,  an  almost  unconscious  habit  with  nearly 
every  writer  of  point.  Taste  is  not  a  merit  of  Fuller's ;  he  is  an 
eccentric  writer,  setting  good  taste  at  defiance  in  the  pursuit  of 
his  favourite  effect.  An  historian  and  an  antiquary  in  name,  he 
is  too  easy  and  superficial  to  rank  high  in  that  species  of  composi- 
tion :  he  has  in  his  favour  simplicity  of  language,  and  almost 
unique  attention  to  arrangement;  but  the  subject-matter  of  his 
works  is  only  a  field  for  the  exercise  of  his  extraordinary  memory 
and  his  irrepressible  wit. 

JEREMY    TAYLOR,    1613-1667. 

A  man  of  genius,  the  most  distinguished  prose  writer  of  this 
period.  He  has  been  called  "  the  Shakspeare  of  English  prose," 
ami  "the  Chrysostom  of  the  English  Pulpit":  and  the  designa- 
tions are  less  fanciful  than  such  designations  often  are. 

Of  his  private   life  few  particulars  uro   known ;  he  id  said  to 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  275 

have  written  an  autobiography,  but  it  has  perished.  Even  the 
main  dates  in  his  public  career  have  been  traced  with  some 
difficulty.  We  know  in  general  that  he  suffered  in  the  temporary 
eclipse  of  the  Episcopalian  party,  and  Chat  he  lived  to  be  rewarded 
at  the  Restoration. 

He  was  born  in  Cambridge,  of  humble  parentage ;  and  educated 
there  at  the  Grammar  School  and  at  Caius  College.  When  only 
twenty  years  of  age,  he  preached  before  Archbishop  Laud,  and  his 
eloquence  and  youthful  beauty  made  such  an  impression  that  the 
prelate  at  once  took  him  under  patronage,  placed  him  at  All  Souls 
in  Oxford,  procured  him  a  fellowship,  and  appointed  him  one  of 
his  own  chaplains.  In  1637-38,  he  was  presented  by  the  Bishop 
of  London  to  the  rectory  of  Uppingham,  in  Rutlandshire.  At  the 
breaking  out  of  the  Civil  War,  he  repaid  the  favour  of  his  patrons 
by  a  work  in  defence  of  Episcopacy  ;  for  this  the  king  made  him 
D.D.,  while  the  Presbyterians,  then  rapidly  gaining  strength, 
sequestrated  his  rectory. 

About  1643  ne  retired  to  the  residence  of  his  mother-in-law  in 
Wales,  but  before  he  had  been  long  there,  the  tide  of  war  rolling 
in  that  direction,  he  was  taken  prisoner  by  the  forces  of  the  Parlia- 
ment, and  kept  for  some  time  in  confinement.  On  his  release  he 
supported  himself  by  keeping  a  school,  and  during  that  time  com- 
posed his  '  Liberty  of  Prophesying.'  Thereafter  he  found  a  patron 
in  the  Earl  of  Carbery,  and  lived  for  some  years  at  that  nobleman'3 
seat,  Golden  Grove.  There  he  wrote  his  '  Life  of  Christ,'  and  a 
work  named  after  the  place,  'Golden  Grove.'  An  attack  upon  the 
Puritans  in  the  'Golden  Grove'  offended  Cromwell;  in  1654  he 
was  apprehended,  and  during  three  or  four  years  more  than  once 
suffered  imprisonment.  In  1658  he  obtained  from  his  friends  an 
alternate  lectureship  at  Lisburne,  in  the  north  of  Ireland,  where 
he  remained  till  the  Restoration.  By  Charles  IL  he  was  made 
Bishop  of  Down  and  Connor,  and  subsequently  of  Dromore.  He 
died  at  Portmore,  on  the  3d  of  August  1667. 

Most  of  his  works  were  written  during  his  virtual  exile  in  Wales. 
The  exceptions  were  strictly  professional  works :  '  Episcopacy 
Asserted,'  published  in  1642  ;  '  Discourse  of  Confirmation,'  in 
1663,  after  his  elevation  to  the  bishopric;  and  'Dissuasive  from 
Popery,'  in  1664.  His  'Liberty  of  Prophesying,'  'Life  of  Christ,' 
'  Holy  Living  and  Holy  Dying,'  and  '  Ductor  Dubitantium,'  were 
all  composed  during  his  seclusion,  the  last  work  being  completed 
at  Lisburne.  His  treatise  on  '  Repentance '  was  written  between 
1654  and  1658,  during  his  imprisonments. 

Taylor  was  a  very  handsome  man,  rather  above  the  middle 
height,  with  a  dark  sparkling  eye,  and  features  almost  feminine  in 
their  delicacy. 

The  characteristic  of  his  intellect  is  luxuriant  activity  and  pro- 


276  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

duetiveness  rather  than  accuracy  or  taste.1  For  one  that  wrote  so 
much  and  was  not  merely  an  unproductive  dungeon  of  learning, 
his  scholarship  was  enormous :  but  he  does  not  seem  to  have  veri- 
fied his  references  with  much  care,  and  he  has  been  detected  iu 
some  ludicrously  bad  translations.  Comparatively  few  items  of 
his  learning  were  allowed  to  sleep ;  all  his  works,  whether  techni- 
cal, controversial,  or  practical,  are  crowded  with  superfluous  quota- 
tions and  allusions.  As  an  evidence  of  his  intellectual  activity, 
consider  what  he  wrote  during  his  residence  in  Wales,  the  variety 
of  subjects  that  he  entertained  ;  compare  him  in  this  respect  with 
the  "judicious"  Hooker,  a  more  careful  scholar,  but  a  much  less 
active  producer.  The  same  characteristic  appears  in  his  impas- 
sioned flights ;  he  is,  says  De  Quincey,  "  restless,  fervid,  aspiring, 
scattering  abroad  a  prodigality  of  life."  He  abandons  himself 
without  reserve  to  the  inspiration  of  the  moment,  eagerly  accumu- 
lating circumstances  and  similitudes,  his  free  flight  trammelled  by 
no  punctilious  care  to  frame  the  particulars  into  a  harmonious 
whole.  In  the  filling  out  of  his  opulent  pictures,  he  is  equally 
unimpeded  by  a  scrupulous  regard  for  facts ;  in  his  telling  illustra- 
tions of  the  decay  of  human  splendour,  he  takes  upon  trust  the 
most  outrageous  fables. 

With  all  his  scholarship  and  ingenuity,  he  had,  if  we  may  judge 
from  his  writings,  a  youthful  freshness  of  sentiment  When  thrust 
from  his  living  by  the  great  Rebellion,  he  did  not  acquiesce  in 
silence,  but,  trusting  probably  to  his  distance  from  the  centre  of 
power  and  to  the  protection  of  Lord  Carbery,  he  denounced  the 
new  Government  as  "  disgracing  the  articles  of  religion,  and  pol- 
luting public  assemblies,"  and  stigmatised  the  new  preachers  as 
"impertinent  and  ignorant,"  fruitless  "crabstocks."  Thus  warm 
in  his  expressions  of  dislike,  he  was  no  less  warm  in  his  expressions 
of  affection :  with  all  his  learning,  a  vain,  warm-hearted,  childlike 
man.  It  seems  strange  that  there  should  ever  have  been  among 
biographers  a  dispute  whether  or  not  he  was  a  woman-hater.  Ten- 
derness would  seem  to  have  been  his  ruling  emotion.  "  There  is 
nothing,"  he  says,  "can  please  a  man  without  love."  His  works 
contain  many  passages  of  demonstrative  affection.  He  expatiates 
with  peculiar  fondness  upon  children,  and  upon  the  delights  of  the 

i  We  made  a  somewhat  similar  remark  about  Bacon,  and  as  the  two  minds  are 
so  different  in  their  general  figure,  in  their  appearance  as  wholes,  it  may  be  well 
to  mention  the  more  important  analysed  elements  of  difference.  One  vast  dif- 
ference lies  in  this,  that  Bacon  was  more  original  and  constructive :  Bacon,  as 
his  chaplain  says,  "  never  was  a  plodder  upon  books,"  and  had  comparatively 
little  scholarship  ;  Taylor's  scholarship  is  a  standing  subject  of  wonder  and  ad- 
miration. Bacon  had  very  little  poetical  feeling ;  Taylor  had  all  the  gifts  of  a 
pc«jt  except  metre.  The  two  men  resemble  each  other  in  their  enormous  powers 
of  intellectual  work ;  they  diifer  immeasurably  in  the  quality  and  direction  of 
thvt  work. 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  277 

*'  sanctuary  and  refectory  "  of  the  domestic  circle,  "  his  gardens  of 
sweetness  and  chaste  refreshment" 

In  a  writer  of  casuistical  morality,  profoundly  versed  in  the 
interminable  dusty  volumes  of  the  schoolmen,  we  should  not  ex- 

?2ct  much  sensibility  to  the  beauties  and  grandeurs  of  nature, 
et  Taylor  shows  this  sensibility  in  rich  abundance.  He  was  not 
a  dry,  unmoved  observer  like  Bacon.  He  had  a  profound  suscep- 
tibility to  the  luxuries  of  the  eye.  In  our  illustrations  of  his  style, 
we  shall  quote  many  evidences  of  his  delighted  contemplation  of 
external  life.  It  probably  was  the  charm  derived  from  this 
source  that  commended  his  writings  so  powerfully  to  the  nature- 
poets  of  this  century.  Not  only  was  he  alive  to  beauties  of  form 
and  colour,  and  to  tender  associations :  he  looked  with  delight 
upon  the  grandeurs  of  nature,  upon  the  exciting  phenomena 
of  storms  and  tempests.  Rarely  indeed  do  we  find  such  scholar- 
ship and  subtlety  combined  with  so  fresh  an  interest  in  the  outer 
world. 

Of  gentle  disposition  and  ingratiating  manners,  he  had  not  the 
hardihood  required  for  the  stir  and  bustle  of  practical  life.  He 
showed  none  of  the  political  capacity  of  Whitgift  or  of  Laud.  His 
eloquence  and  personal  grace  made  him  a  favourite :  his  learning 
and  his  services  as  a  literary  champion  sanctioned  his  promotion 
to  a  bishopric.  Warm  in  his  expressions  of  resentment,  he  had 
not  the  courage  of  a  martyr.  When  imprisoned  for  his  outburst 
against  the  Puritans,  he  was  not  obdurate  in  his  recriminations ; 
he  did  not  spend  his  imprisonment  in  the  refractory  occupation  of 
composing  further  invectives,  but  quietly  turned  to  his  books,  and 
wrote  his  treatise  on  Repentance. 

The  most  generally  celebrated  of  Taylor's  opinions  are  those 
contained  in  his  '  Discourse  of  the  Liberty  of  Prophesying.'  It  is 
an  elaborate  argument  for  religious  toleration.  It  does  not  recom- 
mend absolute  freedom  of  opinion ;  it  makes  a  stand  upon  the 
Apostles'  Creed,  and  urges  that  no  person  subscribing  to  this 
should  be  denied  communion  by  any  Christian  sect  It  even 
allows  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  clause  regarding  Christ's 
descent  into  hell.  The  argument  of  the  work  is  not  abstract,  a 
priori  :  he  does  not  uphold  freedom  to  differ  as  a  "  natural  right " ; 
this  idea  was  of  later  growth.  He  reasons  from  experience ; 
pointing  out  the  difficulty  of  ascertaining  the  real  truth  ;  dilating 
upon,  and,  after  his  wont,  copiously  exemplifying,  the  fallibility 
of  all  human  interpreters  of  Scripture — Popes,  Councils,  Fathers, 
or  Writers  Ecclesiastical  The  work  is  not,  as  is  sometimes  stated, 
the  first  direct  argument  for  toleration.  It  arose  naturally  at  a 
time  when  difference  of  opinion,  prolific  of  bitter  dissensions  for 
almost  a  century,  had  culminated  in  the  distraction  of  civil  war. 


278  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

While  Taylor  deserves  and  will  ever  receive  all  honour  for  his 
spirit  of  moderation,  it  would  be  unjust  to  Grindall,  Hales,  Chil- 
lingworth,  and  other  tolerant  Churchmen  of  former  generations,  to 
represent  him  as  the  first  advocate  of  religious  liberality. 

His  opinions  on  original  sin  made  greater  noise  in  his  own  day 
than  his  toleration.  He  was  accused  of  being  Pelagian,  and  seems 
to  have  held  that  original  sin  is  "  an  effect  or  condition  of  nature, 
but  no  sin  properly,"  that  it  cannot  be  repented  of,  in  the  proper 
sense  of  the  word  repent,  and  that  no  person  shall  be  visited  with 
eternal  damnation  for  original  sin  only. 

His  '  Ductor  Dubitantium '  (Guide  to  the  Scrupulous) — a  work 
filling  two  closely-printed  large  octavo  volumes,  in  Mr  Eden's 
revision  of  Heber's  edition — occupies  a  middle  position  between 
the  casuistry  of  the  schoolmen  and  the  moral  philosophy  of  such 
writers  as  Tucker  and  Paley.  He  deals  more  with  the  exposition 
of  general  principles  than  the  scholastic  casuists,  and  exhibits  a 
larger  number  of  cases  and  a  greater  subtlety  in  distinguishing 
degrees  of  guilt  than  Paley. 

ELEMENTS   OP   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — The  pedantic  bookish  element  is  very  conspicuous 
in  Taylor's  language.  He  coins  extensively  both  from  Latin  and 
from  Greek.  He  uses  "  deturpated  "  for  deformed,  "  clancularly  " 
for  secretly,  "  immorigerous "  for  disobedient,  "  intenerate "  for 
•render  soft,  "paranymph"  for  lady's-maid.  In  like  manner  he 
applies  words  according  to  their  Latin  etymology,  and  contrary  to 
the  growing  usage — "  insolent "  in  the  sense  of  unusual,  "  extant 
figures "  (figures  in  relief),  an  "  excellent "  pain  (surpassing,  ex- 
treme). 

He  has,  besides,  some  few  mannerisms.  He  goes  beyond  the 
extreme  idiomatic  licence  in  the  way  of  forming  plurals  to  abstract 
nouns — " aversenesses,"  "dissolutions,"  "prudencies,"  "strengths," 
"tolerations."  Also,  he  uses  abstract  nouns  in  the  same  construc- 
tion with  concrete  nouns,  and  where  the  construction  is  unidio- 
matic  for  abstract  nouns.  This  occurs  very  often,  and  appears  in 
several  of  our  quotations.  As  an  example  for  the  present  take  the 
following :  "  The  despised  drops  were  grown  into  an  artificial 
river  and  an  intolerable  mischief ; "  "  the  rivulet  swelling  into 
rivers  and  a  vastness ;  "  "  the  sea  shall  descend  into  hollowness  and 
a  prodigious  drought."  Another  usage  has  been  noted, — the  com- 
parative employed  to  express  a  degree  short  of  the  extreme ;  but 
this  is  not  so  peculiar.  Examples  are — '*  The  Libyan  lion  drawn 
from  his  wilder  foragings ; "  "a  sad  arrest  of  the  looseness  and 
wilder  feasts  of  the  French  Court." 

These  "  pedanterias "  aside,   Taylor  has  a  powerful  command 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  279 

of  the  language.      There  was  no  greater  master  of  English  in 
his  day. 

Sentences. — He  is  very  careless  in  the  structure  of  his  sentences. 
In  few  passages  even  of  his  driest  works  is  the  syntax  grammatical 
in  six  sentences  upon  end ;  and  when  he  warms  to  his  subject,  he 
adds  clause  to  clause  as  it  were  in  a  breath,  without  stopping  to 
look  back  and  see  whether  the  accumulation  has  resulted  in  a 
coherent  sentence.  Inasmuch  as  he  always  writes  with  verve,  this 
characteristic  meets  us  in  every  page,  indeed  very  often  in  the  first 
sentence.  As  an  example,  take  the  first  sentence  in  his  '  Contem- 
plations on  Time,'  where  the  connection  of  the  clauses  and  the 
sequence  of  the  tenses  are  alike  irregular : — 

"All  philosophers  which  have  thotight  of  the  nature  of  time,  and  which 
with  much  subtlety  have  disputed  what  it  was,  at  length  come  to  conclude, 
That  they  knew  not  what  it  is  ;  the  most  they  can  reach  unto  is,  That  no 
time  is  long ;  and  that  can  only  be  called  time  which  is  present,  the  which 
is  but  a  moment ;  and  how  can  that  be  said  to  be,  since  the  only  cause  why 
it  is,  is  because  it  shall  not  be,  but  is  to  pass  into  t\w  preterit,  so  as  we  can- 
not affirm  it  to  have  a  being  ? " 

Very  often  his  sentence  is  a  string  of  statements  bearing  on  the 
same  subject,  each  joined  to  the  preceding  by  the  conjunction 
"and."  The  following  is  of  unusual  length,  but  otherwise  is  a 
fair  specimen : — 

"But  when  Christian  religion  was  planted,  and  had  taken  root,  and  had 
filled  all  lands,  then  all  the  nature  of  things,  the  whole  creation,  became 
servant  to  the  kingdom  of  grace ;  and  the  head  of  the  religion  is  also  the 
head  of  the  creatures,  and  ministers  all  the  things  of  the  world  in  order  to 
the  spirit  of  grace :  and  now  '  angels  are  ministering  spirits  sent  forth  to 
minister  for  the  good  of  them  that  fear  the  Lord  ; '  and  all  the  violences  of 
men,  and  things  of  nature,  and  choice,  are  forced  into  subjection  and 
lowest  ministries,  and  to  co-operate  as  with  an  united  design,  to  verify  all 
the  promises  of  the  Gospel,  and  to  secure  and  advantage  all  the  children  of 
the  kingdom :  and  now  he  that  is  made  poor  by  chance  or  persecution,  is 
made  rich  by  religion  ;  and  he  that  hath  nothing," — and  so  on. 

One  thing  his  sentences  are  free  from ;  they  are  very  rarely 
made  intricate  by  elaborate  involutions  and  suspensions  such  as 
we  find  in  Hooker.  He  has  many  classical  idioms  and  superfluous 
connectives,  but  the  structure  is  simple. 

Artificial  condensations  are  pretty  frequent  The  peculiar  use 
of  the  abstract  noun  (p.  278)  is  a  mode  of  condensation.  In  many 
cases  the  condensation  is  more  marked  than  in  those  quoted,  as, 
for  example,  in  the  following : — 

"And  what  can  we  complain  of  the  weakness  of  our  strengths,  or  the 
pressure  of  diseases,  when  we  see  a  poor  soldier  stand  in  a  breach  almost 
starved  with  cold  and  hunger,  and  his  cold  apt  to  be  relieved  only  by  the  heats 
of  anger,  a  fever,  or  a  fired  musket,  and  his  hunger  slacked  by  a  greater  pain 
and  a  huge  fear  1  This  man  shall  stand  in  his  arms,  and  wounds,  patiens 


280  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

luminls  atque  solis,  pale  and  faint,  weary  and  watchful  ;  and  at  night  shall 
have  a  bullet  )>ull?,d  out  of  his  flesh,  and  shivers  from  his  bones,  and  endure 
his  mouth  to  be  sewed  up  from  a  violent  rent  to  its  own  dimension." 

Figures  of  Speech. — Taylor's  style  is  richly  embellished  with 
metaphors  and  similes  taken  from  numerous  sources,  from  famil- 
iar operations  of  life,  from  nature,  and  from  books.1  These  need 
not  be  specially  illustrated.  On  the  figures  taken  from  books,  the 
remark  may  be  made  that  they  are  often  absurdly  learned.  Thia 
belongs  to  the  parade  of  scholarship  already  mentioned  as  being 
fostered  in  English  sermons  by  the  taste  of  the  Court  Taylor 
carries  this  pedantry  to  an  extrema  Any  of  his  contemporaries 
or  predecessors  might  have  said  that  "  Nero  might  be  called  Most 
Clement  with  as  much  reason  as  some  princes  are  styled  Most 
Magnificent ; "  but  perhaps  none  of  them  would  have  ventured 
to  speak  in  their  sermons  of  "the  tender  lard  of  the  Apulian 
swine,"  or  "garments  stained  with  the  Tyrian  fish,"  or  "garments 
made  of  the  Calabrian  fleece,  and  stained  with  the  blood  of  the 
murex." 

His  most  notable  and  characteristic  figures  are  the  elaborate 
similitudes  from  nature.  In  these  he  does  not  confine  himself  to 
the  features  of  strict  resemblance,  but  makes  each  similitude  a 
complete  picture  in  a  single  sentence,  the  circumstances  being 
accumulated  in  the  opulent  irregular  manner  already  described. 
The  following  are  instances ;  others  occur  in  the  illustration  of  hia 
pathos : — 

"  So  we  sometimes  espy  a  bright  cloud  formed  into  an  irregular  figure ; 
when  it  is  observed  by  unskilful  and  fantastic  travellers,  it  looks  like  a 
centaur  to  some,  and  as  a  castle  to  others ;  some  tell  that  they  saw  an  army 
with  banners,  and  it  signifies  war;  but  another  wiser  than  this  fellow,  says 
it  looks  for  all  the  world  like  a  flock  of  sheep,  and  foretells  plenty  ;  and  all 
the  while  it  is  nothing  but  a  shining  cloud,  by  its  own  mobility  and  the 
activity  of  a  wind  cast  into  a  contingent  and  inartificial  shape  ;  so  it  is  in 
this  great  mystery  of  our  religion,  in  which  some  espy  strange  things  which 
God  intended  not,  and  others  see  not  what  God  has  plainly  told." 

"  For  so  have  I  known  the  boisterous  north  wind  pass  through  the  yield- 
ing air  which  opened  its  bosom,  and  appeased  its  violence  by  entertaining  it 
with  easy  compliance  in  all  the  regions  of  its  reception  :  but  when  the  same 
breath  of  heaven  hath  been  checked  with  the  stiffness  of  a  tower,  or  the 
united  strength  of  a  wood,  it  grew  mighty  and  dwelt  there,  and  made  the 

1  The  fanciful  conceits  of  the  time  appear  in  considerable  numbers.  Even 
Euphuism,  in  the  restricted  sense  of  similitudes  from  fabulous  natural  history, 
shows  itself  now  and  again.  Thus,  "No  creature  among  beasts,  but  being 
smitten,  will  fall  upon  the  way  to  relieve  itself,  except  a  blind  incogitant  sinner. 
Such  as  have  written  upon  their  sagacity  in  that  kind,  tell  us  that  the  fishes  in 
the  fresh  water,  being  struck  with  a  tool  of  iron,  will  rub  themselves  upon  the 
glutinous  skin  of  the  tench  to  be  cured.  The  hart  wounded  with  an  arrow  runs 
to  the  herb  dittany  to  bite  it,  that  the  shaft  may  fall  out  that  stuck  in  his  body. 
The  swallow  will  seek  out  the  green  tetterwort  to  recover  the  eyes  of  her  young 
ones  when  they  are  blinded.  Only  a  stupid  sinner  1'orgets,"  &c. 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  281 

highest  branches  stoop,  and  make  a  smooth  path  for  it  on  the  top  of  all  its 
glories.  So  is  sickness,  and  so  is  the  grace  of  God. "  (In  reference  to  the 
subduing  power  of  sickness  and  the  evils  of  impatience.) 

"  For  so  doth  the  humble  ivy  creep  at  the  foot  of  the  oak,  and  leans  npon 
its  lowest  base,  and  begs  shade  and  protection,  and  leave  to  grow  under  its 
branches,  and  pay  a  friendly  influence  for  its  mighty  patronage ;  and  they 
grow  and  dwell  together,  and  are  the  most  remarkable  of  friends  and  married 
pairs  of  all  the  leafy  nation."  (An  illustration  of  the  connection  between 
Church  and  State.) 

In  these  similitudes,  as  the  reader  will  notice,  he  throws  aside 
the  purpose  of  close  and  pointed  illustration,  and  luxuriates  in  fill- 
ing up  the  picture  for  its  own  sake.  Another  instance  shows  a  still 
more  rapturous  plenitude  of  picturesque  details  : — 

"  For  thus  the  sun  is  the  eye  of  the  world  ;  and  he  is  indifferent  to  the 
negro  or  the  cold  Russian,  to  them  that  dwell  under  the  Hue,  and  them  that 
stand  near  the  tropics,  the  scalded  Indian,  or  the  poor  boy  that  shakes  at 
the  foot  of  the  Riphean  hills;  but  the  flexures  of  the  heaven  and  the  earth, 
the  conveniency  of  abode,  and  the  approaches  to  the  north  or  south,  respec- 
tively change  the  emanations  of  his  beams  ;  not  that  they  do  not  pass  always 
from  him,  but  that  they  are  not  equally  received  below,  but  by  periods  and 
chauges,  by  little  inlets  and  reflections ;  they  receive  what  they  can,  and 
some  have  only  a  dark  day  and  a  long  night  from  him  ;  snows  and  white 
cattle,  a  miserable  life,  and  a  perpetual  harvest  of  catarrhs  and  consump- 
tions, apoplexies  and  dead  palsies  ;  but  some  have  splendid  fires  and  aromatic 
spices,  rich  wiues  and  well-digested  fruits,  great  wit  and  great  courage,  be- 
cause they  dwell  in  his  eye,  and  look  in  his  face,  and  are  the  courtiers  of  the 
sun,  and  wait  upon  him  in  his  chambers  of  the  east." 

A  great  many  such  outbursts  into  gorgeous  imagery  occur  in 
Taylor's  writings ;  but  the  reader  must  not  expect  to  find  them  in 
every  page. 

QUALITIES   OP  STYLE. 

Simplicity. — Taylor's  style,  though  not  to  be  called  simple,  is 
not  stiff,  nor  stately,  nor  Latinised ;  he  uses  more  familiar  lan- 
guage than  either  Hooker,  or  Milton,  or  Sir  Thomas  Browne.  He 
introduces,  as  we  have  seen,  many  pedantic  terms  and  bookish 
illustrations :  further,  in  his  sermons,  and  still  more  in  his  formal 
treatises,  he  carries  to  an  extreme  the  then  prevailing  fashion  of 
backing  the  most  obvious  statements  with  superfluous  hosts  of 
authorities,  quoting  scraps  of  Latin  and  Greek,  sometimes  with 
translations,  sometimes  without  The  '  Ductor  Dubitantium '  is 
especially  loaded  with  this  cumbersome  scholarship.  Take  as  an 
example  part  of  his  exposition  of  the  "rule"  that  "the  virtual 
and  interpretative  consent  of  the  will  is  imputed  to  Good  or 
Evil "  :— 

"  I.  This  rule  is  intended  to  explicate  the  nature  of  social  crimes,  in 
which  a  man's  will  is  deeper  than  his  hand,  though  the  action  of  the  will  id 
ofteu  indirect  and  collateral,  consequent  or  distant ;  but  it  by  any  means  it 


282  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

hath  a  portion  into  the  effect,  it  is  entire  in  the  guilt  And  this  happens 
many  ways. 

"2.  (l)  By  ratihabition  and  confirmation. 

"  '  In  maleficio  ratihabitio  mandato  comparatur,'  saith  the  law  :  To  com- 
mand another  to  do  violence  is  imputed  to  him  that  commands  it  more  than 
to  him  that  does  it.  So  Ulpian,  interpreting  the  interdict '  Unde  tu  ilium 
vi  dejeci.iti,'  affirms  'eum  quoqne  dejicere  qui  alteri  mandavit  vel  jussit:' 
and  therefore  Ptolemy  was  guilty  of  the  blood  of  Pompey,  when  he  sent 
Photinus  to  kill  him — 

1  Hie  factum  domino  prestitit.' — MARTIAL. 

Now  because  ratihabition  is,  by  presumption  of  law,  esteemed  as  a  com- 
mandment, therefore  Ulpian  affirms  of  both  alike,  '  Dejicit  et  qui  mandat, 
et  dejicit  qui  ratum  habet : '  '  He  that  commands  and  he  that  consents  after 
it  is  done,  are  equally  responsible.'  Now,  though  the  law  particularly  affirms 
this  only  '  in  maleficio,'  in  criminal  and  injurious  actions,  yet,  in  the  edition 
of  Holoander,  that  clause  is  not  inserted,  and  it  is  also  certain,"  &c. 

The  above  is  the  beginning  of  a  section  in  the  '  Ductor  Dubitan- 
tium,'  and  is  a  fair  specimen  of  the  beginnings  of  all  the  sections 
in  that  work. 

The  subjects  discussed  in  the  '  Ductor '  are  of  the  most  abstruse 
kind,  at  least  in  their  scholastic  guise  as  problems  regarding  the 
Conscience  and  the  Will ;  and  were  the  book  written  throughout 
in  the  above  style  it  would  be  still  less  read  than  it  is.  The  above, 
however,  though  a  fair  sample  of  the  beginning,  is  not  a  fair 
sample  of  the  body  of  a  section ;  having  stated  the  problem  in  the 
above  abstruse  fashion,  he  proceeds  to  give  copious  exemplifica- 
tions. Thus,  to  a  reader  once  made  acquainted  with  the  peculiar 
psychology  and  the  technical  distinctions,  the  work  is  not  so  hope- 
lessly perplexing.  Still,  with  every  allowance,  it  is  a  very  abstruse 
production,  never  tempting  the  general  reader,  and  perused  only 
now  and  then  by  an  antiquarian  student  of  ethics ;  its  principal 
use  to  the  student  of  composition  being  to  furnish  an  idea  of  the 
bad  expository  method  of  the  schoolmen. 

In  works  upon  more  familiar  subjects — in  his  sermons  and  in 
his  '  Holy  Living  and  Holy  Dying, ' — he  reiterates  so  much,  and 
presents  his  statements  so  much  "  dressed  up  in  circumstances," 
that  the  heavy  effect  of  his  abstract  language  and  Latin  quota- 
tions is  less  felt :  it  is  felt,  but  more  as  an  encumbrance  than  as  a 
source  of  perplexity.  The  general  run  of  his  language  is  simpla 
His  sermons  are  much  more  easily  followed  than  Donne's. 

In  respect  of  simple  arrangement  he  is  far  from  being  equal  to 
Fuller.  Compare,  for  example,  the  '  Holy  Living '  with  Fuller's 
'  Holy  Stata'  Fuller  is  less  pretentious :  he  takes  up  severally 
different  ranks  and  conditions  of  men, — Servants,  Masters,  Hus- 
bands, Bishops,  &c. — and  lays  down  maxims  for  the  guidance  of 
each  :  and  besides  this,  discusses  certain  virtues  one  after  another 
in  an  easy  way,  with  no  attempt  at  classification.  Taylor  is  more 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  283 

ambitious  of  a  complete  system  of  ethics.  Tie  takes  a  general 
view  of  the  subject,  maps  it  out  into  three  divisions — Christian 
Sobriety,  Christian  Justice,  and  Christian  Religion  (corresponding 
to  the  common  division — Duty  to  ourselves,  Duty  to  others,  Duty 
to  God).  Having  mapped  out  the  subject,  he  proceeds  to  consider 
various  virtues — Modesty,  Humility,  Obedience  to  superiors,  Faith, 
«fec. — in  minute  detail  But  while  more  complete  and  exhaustive 
than  Fuller,  he  is  much  less  easy  to  apprehend  and  remember ;  he 
multiplies  subdivisions  with  extravagant  minuteness.  For  ex- 
ample, he  gives  "  Twenty-three  JRules  for  employing  our  Time ;" 
and  the  following  is  his  analysis  of  "  Section  IV.  of  Humility  " : — 

41  Nine  arguments  against  Pride,  by  way  of  Consideration. 
Nineteen  Acts  or  Offices  of  Humility. 
Fourteen  Means  and  Exercises  of  obtaining  and  increasing  the  Grace 

of  Humility. 
Seventeen  Signs  of  Humility. " 

With  reference  to  the  above,  under  the  head  of  Clearness,  it  is 
to  be  observed  that  the  want  of  simplicity  in  this  tedious  sub- 
dividing is  not  compensated  by  a  gain  of  precision.  On  the  con- 
trary, both  in  the  larger  and  in  the  smaller  divisions,  there  is 
much  overlapping  and  confusion.  He  is  too  hurried  and  careless 
to  be  either  easy  to  understand  or  accurate  in  his  divisions  and 
classifications.  Speed  is  everything  with  him :  he  seems  to  have 
written  on  impetuously,  recording  his  first  thoughts,  and  instead 
of  obliterating  what  he  saw  to  be  incorrect,  trying  rather  to  square 
it  with  the  truth  by  qualifications — a  fertile  source  of  intricacy  and 
confusion. 

Strength. — We  have  seen  that  our  author's  style  has  not  the 
vigour  of  conciseness,  precision,  finished  aptness  of  expression. 
His  strength  lies  in  quite  an  opposite  direction :  the  style  is 
animated  and  exhilarating  from  its  rapidity  and  opulence  of 
words  and  circumstances ;  not  from  succinct  and  telling  brevity, 
but  from  prodigal  profusion. 

In  every  passage  that  we  have  quoted  this  has  been  conspicu- 
ously evident.  Even  in  his  technical  works  the  unresting  forward 
movement  carries  the  reader  away  as  on  a  rapid  stream.  Where 
the  subject  is  hard  and  the  thought  difficult  to  follow,  this  irregular 
profusion  grows  bewildering ;  but  upon  an  easy  theme,  the  speed 
and  fulness  of  the  tide  is  exhilarating. 

His  design  being  usually  didactic,  it  is  chiefly  in  the  illustrations 
and  examples  that  he  finds  the  greatest  scope  for  the  exhibition  of 
his  peculiar  strength.1  We  shall  see  that  in  the  choice  of  these 

1  With  reference  to  this,  De  Qnincey  ranks  Taylor  among  the  princes  of 
rhetoric  as  opposed  to  eloquence — rhetoric  beinj;  the  art  of  presenting  a  subject 
in  its  most  imposing  aspects,  eloquence  the  utterance  of  deep  feeling  ou  a  subject 
of  intrinsically-absorbing  interest. 


284  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

extrinsic  subjects  he  is  ruled  chiefly  by  the  sentiment  of  tender- 
ness :  as  regards  the  sentiment  of  power,  he  inclines  rather  to  the 
agitation  and  excitement  of  horror  than  to  calm  grandeur,  or  even 
to  any  form  of  might  unattended  with  turbulence  and  danger.  I 
speak  only  of  ruling  tendencies.  I  am  aware  that  many  examples 
of  the  telling  description  of  beneficent  powers  might  be  quoted 
from  his  voluminous  works.  But,  as  a  rule,  in  describing  the 
operations  of  man  or  of  nature,  he  chooses  either  objects  of  tender-" 
ness,  or  objects  of  horror,  or  movements  of  the  "wilder"  character. 
Some  examples  may  be  quoted.  For  one  of  the  "  wilder  "  sort, 
we  may  refer  to  his  animated  description  of  the  "  boisterous  north 
wind  "  (p.  280).  As  an  instance  of  his  piling  up  of  circumstances 
of  horror,  take  the  following  : — 

"  Apollodorus  was  a  traitor  and  a  tyrant,  and  the  world  wondered  to  see 
so  bad  a  man  have  so  good  a  fortune,  but  knew  not  that  he  nourished  scor- 
pions in  his  breast,  and  that  his  liver  and  his  heart  were  eaten  up  with 
spectres  and  images  of  death  ;  his  thoughts  were  full  of  interruptions,  his 
dreams  of  illusions  :  his  fancy  was  abused  with  real  troubles  and  fantastic 
images,  imagining  that  he  saw  the  Scythians  flaying  him  alive,  his  daugh- 
ters like  pillars  of  fire,  dancing  round  about  a  cauldron  in  which  himself 
was  boiling,  and  that  his  heart  accused  itself  to  be  the  cause  of  all  those 
evils." 

"  Nature  hath  given  us  one  harvest  every  year,  but  death  hath  two  :  and 
the  spring  and  the  autumn  sends  throngs  of  men  and  women  to  charnel- 
houses  :  and  all  the  summer  long  men  are  recovering  from  their  evils  of  the 
spring,  till  the  dog-days  come,  and  then  the  Syrian  star  makes  the  summer 
deadly  ;  and  the  fruits  of  autumn  are  laid  up  for  all  the  year's  provision,  and 
the  man  that  gathers  them  eats  and  surfeits,  and  dies  and  needs  them  not, 
and  himself  is  laid  up  for  eternity ;  and  he  that  escapes  till  winter  only  stays 
for  another  opportunity,  which  the  distempers  of  that  quarter  minister  to 
him  with  great  variety.  Thus  death  reigns  in  all  the  portions  of  our  time. 
The  autumn  with  its  fruits  provides  disorders  for  us,  and  the  winter's  cold 
turns  them  imo  sharp  diseases,  and  the  spring  brings  flowers  to  strew  our 
hearse,  and  the  summer  gives  green  turf  and  brambles  to  bind  upon  our 
graves.  Calentures  and  surfeit,  cold  and  agues,  are  the  four  quarters  of  the 
year,  and  all  minister  to  death  ;  and  you  can  go  no  whither  but  you  tread 
upon  a  dead  man's  bones. " 

In  the  description  of  the  Day  of  Judgment,  his  imagination 
revels  in  elements  of  terror : — 

"  Then  all  the  beasts  and  creeping  things,  the  monsters  and  the  usual  in- 
habitants of  the  sea,  shall  be  gathered  together,  and  make  fearful  noises  to 
distract  mankind  :  the  birds  shall  mourn  and  change  their  song  into  threnes 
and  sad  accents  ;  rivers  of  fire  shall  rise  from  east  to  west,  and  the  stars  shall 
be  rent  into  threads  of  light,  and  scatter  like  the  beards  of  comets ;  then 
shall  be  fearful  earthquakes,  and  the  rocks  shall  rend  iu  pieces,  the  tree: 
shall  distil  blood,  and  the  mountains  and  fairest  structures  shall  return  intt 
their  primitive  dust ;  the  wild  beasts  shall  leave  their  dens,  and  shall  conic 
into  the  companies  of  men,  so  that  you  shall  hnrdly  tell  how  to  call  them, 
herds  of  men  or  congregations  of  boasts  ;  then  shall  the  graves  open  an. 
give  up  their  dead,  aiid  those  which  are  alive  iu  nature  and  dead  in  leai 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  285 

shall  be  forced  from  the  rocks  whither  they  went  to  hide  them,  and  from 
caverns  of  the  earth  where  they  would  fain  have  been  concealed;  because 
their  retirements  are  dismantled  and  their  rocks  are  broken  into  wilder  rup- 
tures, and  admit  a  strange  light  into  their  secret  bowels  ;  and  the  men  being 
forced  abroad  into  the  theatre  of  mighty  horrors,  shall  run  up  and  down  dis- 
tracted, and  at  their  wits'  end  ;  and  then  some  shall  die,  and  some  shall  be 
changed ;  and  by  this  time  the  elect  shall  be  gathered  together  from  the  four 
quarters  of  the  world,  and  Christ  shall  come  along  with  them  to  judgment." 

Pathos. — Tenderness  is  the  ruling  quality  of  Taylor's  style — 
tenderness  of  a  peculiar  kind.  Restless  and  hurried,  he  has  little 
of  the  tranquil  melancholy  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne.  He  is  quick 
and  versatile,  hurrying  from  circumstance  to  circumstance,  and 
from  mood  to  mood.  In  accordance  with  this  impetuosity,  his 
expression  of  pity,  affection,  and  charmed  sense  of  beauty  is,  as  it 
were,  demonstrative  and  voluble.  At  times  he  shows  the  most 
exquisite  delicacy  of  feeling,  at  other  times  he  dwells  too  long 
upon  disgusting  details,  though  seldom  without  some  redeeming 
touches ;  but  whatever  be  the  mode  of  the  feeling,  the  expression 
is  always  eager  and  impetuous,  never  lingering  upon  one  circum- 
stance, but  always  hurrying  off  to  another. 

The  following  is  a  fair  specimen  of  his  versatile  habit,  and 
exemplifies  the  episodes  of  rare  beauty  that  diversify  passages  of 
general  gloom : — 

"  It  is  a  mighty  change  that  is  made  by  the  death  of  every  person,  and  it 
is  visible  to  us  who  are  alive.  Reckon  but  from  the  sprightfulness  of  youth 
and  the  fair  cheeks  and  the  full  eyes  of  childhood,  from  the  vigorousness 
and  strong  flexure  of  the  joints  of  five-and-twenty,  to  the  hollowness  and 
dead  paleness,  to  the  loathsomeness  and  horror  of  a  three  days'  burial,  and 
we  shall  perceive  the  distance  to  be  very  great  and  very  strange.  But 
so  I  have  seen  a  rose  newly  springing  from  the  clefts  of  his  hood,  and  at 
first  it  was  fair  as  the  morning,  and  full  with  the  dew  of  heaven,  as  a  lamb's 
fleece :  but  when  a  rude  breath  had  forced  open  its  virgin  modesty,  and 
dismantled  its  too  youthful  and  unripe  retirements,  it  began  to  put  on  dark- 
ness, and  to  decline  to  softness  and  the  symptoms  of  a  sickly  age  ;  it  bowed 
the  head,  and  broke  its  stalk,  and  at  night,  having  lost  some  of  its  leaves 
and  all  its  beauty,  it  fell  into  the  portion  of  weeds  and  outworn  faces.  The 
same  is  the  portion  of  every  man  and  every  woman  ;  the  heritage  of  worms 
and  serpents,  rottenness  and  cold  dishonour,  and  our  beauty  so  changed, 
that  our  acquaintance  quickly  know  us  not  ;  and  that  change  mingled  with 
so  much  horror,  or  else  meets  so  with  our  fears  and  weak  discoursings,  that 
they  who  six  hours  ago  tended  upon  us,  either  with  charitable  or  ambitious 
services,  cannot  without  some  regret  stay  in  the  room  alone  where  the  body 
lies  stript  of  its  life  and  honour.  I  have  read  of  a  fair  young  German  gentle- 
man, who,  living,  often  refused  to  be  pictured,  but  put  off  the  importunity 
of  his  friends'  desire  by  giving  way  that  after  a  few  days'  burial  they  might 
send  a  painter  to  his  vault,  and  if  they  saw  cause  for  it,  draw  the  image  of 
his  death  unto  the  life.  They  did  so,  and  found  his  face  half  eaten,  and  his 
midriff  and  backbone  full  of  serpents;  and  so  he  stands  pictured  amongst 
his  armed  ancestors.  So  does  the  fairest  beauty  change,  and  it  will  be  as 
bad  with  you  and  me  ;  and  then,  what  servants  shall  we  have  to  wait  upon 
us  in  the  grave  f  what  friends  to  visit  us !  what  ollicious  people  to  cleanse 


286  FROM   1G40   TO   1670. 

away  the  moist  and  unwholesome  cloud  reflected  upon  our  faces  from  the 
sides  of  the  weeping  vaults,  which  are  the  longest  weepers  for  our  funeral  ?" 

The  'Holy  Dying,'  which  sets  forth  all  the  miseries  of  the 
human  lot  as  an  inducement l  "  to  look  somewhere  else  for  an 
abiding  city,"  is  full  of  touching  pity.  The  two  following  ex- 
amples are  among  the  best  passages,  being  less  disfigured  with 
horrors  than  others  that  might  be  quoted;  in  both  we  mark  the 
volubility  already  spoken  of  : — 

"The  wild  fellow  in  Petronius  that  escaped  upon  a  broken  table  from  the 
furies  of  a  shipwreck,  as  he  was  sunning  himself  upon  the  rocky  shore, 
espied  a  man  rolled  upon  his  floating  bed  of  waves,  ballasted  with  sand  in 
the  folds  of  his  garment,  and  carried  by  his  civil  enemy  the  sea  towards  the 
shore  to  find  a  grave  :  and  it  cast  him  into  some  sad  thoughts :  Ttiat  per- 
adventure  this  man's  wife  in  some  part  of  the  continent,  safe  and  warm, 
looks  next  month  for  the  good  man's  safe  return  :  or  it  may  be  his  son 
knows  nothing  of  the  tempest  ;  or  his  father  thinks  of  that  affectionate  kiss 
which  still  is  warm  upon  the  good  old  man's  cheek  ever  since  he  took  a  kind 
farewell,  and  he  weeps  with  joy  to  think  how  blessed  he  shall  he  when  his 
beloved  boy  returns  into  the  circle  of  his  father's  arms.  These  are  the 
thoughts  of  mortals,  this  the  end  and  sum  of  all  their  designs  :  a  dark 
night  and  an  ill  guide,  a  boisterous  sea  and  a  broken  cable,  a  hard  rock 
ami  a  rough  wind  dashed  in  pieces  the  fortune  of  a  whole  family,  and  they 
that  shall  weep  loudest  for  the  accident  are  not  yet  entered  into  the  storm^ 
and  yet  have  suffered  shipwreck." 

"  A  man  may  read  a  sermon,  the  best  and  most  passionate  that  over  man 
preached,  if  he  shall  but  enter  into  the  sepulchres  of  kings.  In  the  same 
Escurial  where  the  Spanish  princes  live  in  greatness  and  power,  and  decree 
war  or  peace,  they  have  wisely  placed  a  cemetery  where  their  ashes  and 
their  glory  shall  sleep  till  time  shall  be  no  more ;  and  where  our  kings 
have  been  crowned,  their  ancestors  lie  interred,  and  they  must  walk  over 
their  grandsire's  head  to  take  his  crown.  There  is  an  acre  sown  with  royal 
seed,  the  copy  of  the  greatest  change,  from  rich  to  naked,  from  ceiled  roof's 
to  arched  coffins,  from  living  like  gods  to  die  like  men.  There  is  enough  to 
cool  the  flame  of  lust,  to  abate  the  heights  of  pride,  to  appease  the  itch  ot 
covetous  desires,  to  sully  and  dash  out  the  dissembling  colours  of  a  lustful, 
artificial,  and  imaginary  beauty.  There  the  warlike  and  the  peaceful,  and 
the  fortunate  and  the  miserable,  the  beloved  and  the  despised  princes  mingle 
their  dust  and  pay  down  their  symbol  of  mortality,  and  tell  all  the  wo^ld 
that,  when  we  die,  our  ashes  shall  be  equal  to  kings',  and  our  accounts 
easier,  and  our  pains  for  our  crowns  shall  be  less." 

Much  of  his  pathos  is  not  mournful,  but  consists  of  the  ex- 
pression of  tenderness  for  objects  of  beauty  and  affection.  Most 
of  his  natural  similitudes  are  of  this  character.  He  has  a  keen 
sense  of  the  bright  fresh  pleasure  of  the  eye.  "  The  young  man 
dances  like  a  bubble  empty  and  gay,  and  shines  like  a  dove's 
neck,  or  the  image  of  a  rainbow ; "  drizzling  rain-drops  are  "  the 
descending  pearls  of  a  misty  morning."  In  like  manner  he 
speaks  with  delight  of  "  the  beauty  of  the  peacock's  train,  or 
the  ostrich-plume,"  and  of  children  "  making  garlands  of  useless 

1  See  p.  288. 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  287 

daisies."  In  a  passage  already  quoted  he  compares  a  procession 
of  clouds  to  "an  army  with  banners."  His  love  for  bright  young 
children,  and  fresh  but  fragile  natural  things,  is  a  kindred  vein  of 
sentiment : — 

"Every  little  thing  can  blast  an  infant  blossom  ;  and  the  breath  of  the 
south  can  shake  the  little  rings  of  the  vine  when  first  they  b*gin  to  curl  like 
the  locks  of  a  new-weaned  boy :  but  when  by  age  and  consolidation  they 
stiffen  into  the  hardness  of  a  stem,  and  have,  by  the  warm  embraces  of  the 
sun  and  the  kisses  of  heaven,  brought  forth  their  clusters,  they  can  endure 
the  storms  of  the  north  and  the  loud  noises  of  a  tempest  and  yet  never  be 
broken. " 

"  For  so  have  I  seen  a  lark  rising  from  his  bed  of  grass,  and  soaring  up- 
wards, singing  as  he  rises  and  hopes  to  get  to  heaven,  and  climb  above  the 
clouds ;  but  the  poor  bird  was  beaten  back  with  the  loud  sighings  of  an 
eastern  wind,  and  his  motion  made  irregular  and  inconstant,  descending 
more  at  every  breath  of  the  tempest,  than  it  could  recover  by  the  libration 
and  frequent  weighing  of  his  wings ;  till  the  little  creature  was  forced  to  sit 
down  and  pant,  and  stay  till  the  storm  was  over ;  and  then  it  made  a  pros- 
perous flight,  and  did  rise  and  sing,  as  if  it  Jiad  learned  music  and  motion 
from  an  angel,  as  he  passed  sometimes  through,  the  air,  about  his  ministriet 
here  below." 

KINDS   OP   COMPOSITION. 

Description. — Taylor  never  attempts  the  formal  description  of 
landscape ;  and,  we  can  suppose,  from  what  we  know  of  hia 
irregular  genius,  that,  if  he  had  done  so,  his  method  would  have 
been  the  reverse  of  perspicuous.  It  is  well,  however,  in  consider- 
ing his  style  as  applied  to  special  modes  of  composition,  to  bear  in 
mind  his  peculiar  turn  for  accumulating  picturesque  circumstances. 
He  possessed  the  love  of  nature  that  prompts  to  description,  and 
had  descriptive  style  been  developed  in  his  day,  would  probably 
have  been  among  its  masters. 

Exposition, — Nothing  need  be  added  to  what  we  have  said  in 
explaining  his  want  of  simplicity  and  clearness.  He  repeats  a 
proposition  again  and  again  in  an  irregular  fashion,  in  his  own 
words  and  in  the  words  of  favourite  authorities,  intermingling  hia 
repeated  statements  with  copious  exemplification  and  illustration. 
His  fault  is  the  want  of  method ;  he  is  wastefully  copious  in  all 
the  means  of  exposition,  if  only  he  could  have  employed  them  on 
a  better  plan. 

Persuasion. — As  a  moral  orator  he  is  not  by  any  means  effective. 
Be  Quincey,  as  we  have  said,  considers  that  Taylor  has  carried  off 
the  highest  honours  of  rhetoric ;  and  he  defines  his  peculiar  mean- 
ing of  rhetoric  by  saying  that  where  conviction  begins,  the  province 
of  rhetoric  ends,  implying  that  the  object  of  what  he  understands  by 
rhetoric  is  to  excite  admiration  rather  than  conviction.  Whatever 
may  be  thought  of  the  restriction  of  the  term  rhetoric  to  so  narrow 
a  signification,  this  is  a  good  way  of  expressing  the  effect  of  Tay- 


288  FROM   1640  TO    1670. 

lor's  professed  treatises  on  practical  ethics.  In  the  '  Holy  Dying ' 
we  never  tire  of  admiring  the  wide-ranging  scholarship  and  the 
dazzling  accumulation  of  instances,  imagery,  and  circumstances; 
but  the  application  is  almost  lost  in  the  general  blaze. 

The  truth  is,  that  in  these  professedly  practical  treatises  our 
author  handles  the  subject  moro  as  a  poet  than  as  a  moral 
preacher. 

In  the  representation  of  misery,  the  end  of  the  moral  preacher 
is  not  only  different  from  the  end  of  the  poet,  but  positively 
antagonistic.  The  preacher's  vocation  is  to  rouse  our  activities, 
to  excite  strenuous  endeavour ;  the  vocation  of  the  poet  is  to 
gratify  our  feelings, — rather  to  make  us  weep  over  misery  than  to 
make  us  anxious  for  the  relief  of  actual  sufferers. 

Now  the  effect  of  Taylor's  representation  of  misery  is  poetical 
rather  than  practical  Dilating  on  the  vanity  and  shortness  of 
man's  life,  he  represents  "  the  thousand  thousands  of  accidents  in 
this  world,  and  every  contingency  to  every  man  and  every  crea- 
ture." The  reader  asks  whether  this  is  not  practical  1  whether  it 
is  not  the  most  powerful  means  of  urging  us  to  improve  our  time  1 
True,  it  might  be  so  applied ;  but  the  application  is  not  made  by 
Taylor.  He  pictures  the  contingencies  of  the  human  lot  in  such 
a  way  as  to  put  us  into  a  brooding  melancholy.  He  presents 
an  array  of  unavoidable  fatal  possibilities  —  disease,  shipwreck, 
unforeseen  accident ; l  and  by  presenting  them  as  unavoidable,  at 
once  quenches  every  motive  to  action.  The  effect  upon  readers 
that  should  give  themselves  up  to  the  spirit  of  the  preacher  would 
be  despair  and  horror,  were  it  not  that  he  mingles  the  dismal 
catalogue  with  expressions  of  pity,  moves  our  tender  feelings  by 
painting  the  sorrow  of  friends  over  the  unfortunate  dead,  and 
dwells  upon  the  consolation  of  another  and  a  better  world.  To 
be  sure,  he  professes  to  "  reduce  these  considerations "  (of  uni- 
versal fatality)  "  to  practice ; "  but  the  section  that  undertakes 
to  do  so  is,  in  fact,  another  tale  of  possible  misfortunes,  the  same 
"  scene  of  change  and  sorrow  a  little  more  dressed  up  in  circum- 
stances." 2  He  has  formal  heads  of  practical  rules  and  considera- 
tions ;  but  how  far  these  exhortations  are  from  being  stimulating 
and  practical,  and  what  exquisite  touches  of  poetry  they  contain, 
may  be  seen  in  the  following  example : — 

"  2.  Let  no  man  extend  his  thoughts,  or  let  its  hopes  wander  towards 
future  and  far-distant  events  and  accidental  contingencies.  This  clay  is 
mine  and  yours,  but  ye  know  not  what  shall  be  on  the  morrow ;  and  every 
morning  creeps  out  of  a  dark  cloud,  leaving  behind  it  an  ignorance  and 
silence  deep  as  midnight,  and  undiscerned  as  are  the  phantasms  that  make 
a  crysome  child  to  smile  ;  so  that  we  cannot  discern  what  comes  hereafter, 
unless  we  had  a  light  from  heaven  brighter  than  the  vision  of  an  angel,  even 

1  See  p.  284.  *  See  p.  285. 


ABRAHAM   COWLEY.  289 

the  spirit  of  prophecy.  Without  revelation  we  cannot  tell  whether  we  shall 
eat  to-morrow,  or  whether  a  squinancy  shall  choke  us :  and  it  is  written  in 
the  uurevealed  folds  of  divine  predestination,  that  many  who  are  this  day 
alive  shall  to-morrow  be  laid  upou  the  cold  earth,  and  the  women  shall  weep 
over  their  shroud,  and  dress  them  for  their  funeral." 

Such  passages  are  certainly  not  the  considerations  that  brace  the 
moral  energies.  They  tend  rather  to  lower  the  moral  tone,  to 
throw  the  mind  into  a  despondency ; — a  mournfully  pleasing 
state,  perhaps,  but  undoubtedly  enervating.  From  the  point  of 
view  of  the  poet,  the  above  would  be  admirable  if  it  were  weeded 
of  the  coarse  expression  about  the  squinancy ;  from  the  point  of 
view  of  the  moral  preacher,1  it  is  not  only  useless,  but  positively 
harmful. 

ABRAHAM   COWLEY,  1618-1667. 

Cowley  holds  perhaps  a  higher  rank  among  prose  writers  than 
among  poets.  His  Essays,  written  for  the  most  part  after  the 
Restoration,  mark  an  advance  in  the  art  of  prose  composition. 
The  construction  of  the  sentences  is  often  stumbling  and  awkward, 
but  the  diction  shows  an  increasing  command  over  the  language. 
No  previous  writer,  not  even  Fuller,  is  so  felicitous  as  .Cowley  in 
the  combination  of  words.  His  prose  has  none  of  the  extravagance 
of  his  poetry.  "No  author,"  says  Johnson,  "ever  kept  his  verse 
and  his  prose  at  a  greater  distance  from  each  other.  His  thoughts 
are  natural,  and  his  style  has  a  smooth  and  placid  equability,  which 
has  never  yet  obtained  its  due  commendation.  Nothing  is  far- 
sought  or  hard-laboured ;  but  all  is  easy  without  feebleness,  and 
familiar  without  grossness." 

Perhaps  part  of  the  explanation  of  this  is,  that  for  ten  years  he 
conducted  the  correspondence  of  the  exiled  royal  family — a  kind 
of  experience  likely  to  purify  his  language  both  from  bookish 
terms  and  from  poetical  ornaments.  Whatever  be  the  reason,  his 
combinations  and  turns  of  expression  are  remarkably  modern ; 
here  and  there  short  passages  might  be  quoted  that  we  should 
not  be  surprised  to  find  in  'Blackwood'  or  in  the  'Saturday 
Review.' 

He  was  born  in  London,  the  son  of  a  grocer  ("his  parents 
citizens  of  a  virtuous  life  and  sufficient  estate  "),  and  educated  at 
Westminster  school  and  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  At  the 
age  of  fifteen  he  had  published  a  volume  of  poems ;  and  while  yet 
an  undergraduate,  he  wrote  two  or  three  comedies,  and  the  greater 
part  of  his  '  Davideis.'  When  he  had  been  seven  years  at  Cam- 

1  Throughout  the  above  we  have  used  the  word  preacher  as  a  preacher  of  moral 
conduct.  It  is  not  implied  that  moral  preaching  is  the  sole  function  of  the 
pulpit.  Another  function  is  to  console  the  wretched  under  their  load  of  misei*- 
les.  As  a  preacher  of  consolation  our  author  L  perhaps  unrivalled. 

T 


290  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

bridge,  and  had  proceeded  to  the  degree  of  M.A.,  he  wns,  in  1643, 
at  the  age  of  twenty-five,  ejected  from  that  university  by  the 
Puritan  visitors,  and  took  refuge  in  Oxford.  "About  the  time 
when  Oxford  was  surrendered  to  the  Parliament,  he  followed  the 
Queen  to  Paris,  where  he  became  secretary  to  the  Lord  Jermyn, 
afterwards  Earl  of  St  Albans,  and  was  employed  in  such  corre- 
spondence as  the  royal  cause  required,  and  particularly  in  cipher- 
ing and  deciphering  the  letters  that  passed  between  the  King  and 
Queen — an  employment  of  the  highest  confidence  and  honour.  So 
wide  was  the  province  of  his  intelligence,  that  for  several  years  it 
filled  all  his  days  and  two  or  three  nights  in  the  week."  In  1656 
he  returned  to  England,  was  arrested,  liberated  on  bail,  studied 
medicine,  and  took  out  a  degree  in  1657.  He  remained  in  London 
till  Cromwell's  death,  suspected  of  being  in  secret  communication 
with  the  exiled  family.  At  the  Restoration  he  was  rewarded  with 
a  free  lease  of  certain  lands,  yielding  a  rental  of  ^300,  and  went 
to  reside  at  Chertsea. 

He  found  country  life  very  different  from  his  Arcadian  ideal ; 
but  that  he  was  positively  unhappy  in  his  solitude,  we  have  no 
reason  to  believe.  The  letter  to  Dr  Sprat  that  Johnson  produces 
with  a  malicious  chuckle,  "  for  the  consideration  of  all  that  may 
hereafter  pant  for  solitude,"  is  really  a  humorous  caricature  of  his 
sufferings,  evidently  written  in  high  spirits. 

His  prose  remains  are  few ;  he  considered  "  a  little  tomb  of 
marble  a  better  monument  than  a  vast  heap  of  stones  and  rub- 
bish." Two  prefaces,  a  short  "  Proposition  for  the  Advancement 
of  Experimental  Philosophy,"  a  "  Discourse  by  way  of  Vision, 
concerning  the  Government  of  Oliver  Cromwell,"  and  eleven 
Essays,  are  the  sum-total,  and  they  are  contained  in  a  small 
volume. 

We  get  no  fair  idea  of  Cowley's  intellectual  powers  from  read- 
ing merely  his  prose.  There  we  are  struck  only  by  his  singular 
ease  in  choosing  apt  words,  and  by  the  freshness  and  spirit  of  the 
combinations.  In  his  poetry  he  is  more  "  extravagant  and  Pin- 
darical " ;  the  predominating  veins  of  sentiment  are  the  same  as 
we  find  in  the  Essays  and  the  Discourse  on  Cromwell,  but  he  gives 
a  fuller  licence  to  his  ingenuity.  Describing  the  style  of  the 
"  metaphysical  poets,"  Johnson  says — "  The  most  heterogeneous 
ideas  are  yoked  by  violence  together ;  nature  and  art  are  ransacked 
for  illustrations,  comparisons,  and  allusions ;  their  learning  in- 
structs, and  their  subtilty  surprises  : "  and  among  the  metaphysical 
poets  he  considers  Cowl ey  to  be  "undoubtedly  the  best."  This 
implies  no  mean  powers  of  intellect ;  yet  we  should  not  think  of 
placing  such  a  light  horseman  among  the  intellectual  giants.  He 
is  entitled  to  the  palm  of  fantastic  breadth,  swiftness,  and  subtlety 
s>f  wit ;  and  this  was  probably  all  the  distinction  that  he  coveted. 


ABRAHAM   COWLEY.  291 

Indeed  the  soft  easy  nature  of  the  man  indisposed  him  to  severe 
labour,  whether  of  body  or  of  mind.  "Whatever  was  his  subject, 
he  seems  to  have  been  carried  by  a  kind  of  destiny  to  the  light 
and  the  familiar,  or  to  conceits  which  require  still  more  ignoble 
epithets."  Even  in  his  emotions  he  was  easy  and  averse  to  excite- 
ment. He  was  not  of  an  overflowing  sociability,  like  Thomaa 
Fuller ;  his  ideal  was  to  enjoy  the  company  of  a  few  friends  in 
some  "  gentle  cool  retreat  from  all  the  immoderate  heat  in  which 
the  frantic  world  does  burn  and  sweat."  He  never  married;  and 
his  poems  express  no  depth  of  affection  :  the  only  genuine  pathos 
in  his  writings  flows  from  his  luxurious  love  of  solitude  and  repose. 
Neither  his  prose  nor  his  poetry  gives  evidence  of  strong  anti- 
pathies :  we  shall  quote  some  sharp  invective,  but  it  is  not  personal, 
— it  is  directed  against  abstractions.  He  Joved  to  contemplate,  in 
a  soft  indolent  attitude,  the  spectacle  of  great  power ;  royalist  as 
he  was,  he  could  not  refrain  from  admiring  CromwelL  At  the 
same  time  he  would  not,  like  Carlyle,  have  put  himself  to  the 
trouble  of  searching  the  world  for  heroes  ;  only  when  a  hero  conies 
across  his  path,  he  is  not  impervious  to  astonishment.  Even  in 
his  admiration  of  Cromwell  there  is  no  depth  of  feeling ;  the  rich 
and  elevated  language  of  the  Discourse  on  that  hero  is  dashed 
with  touches  of  humour.  He  has  none  of  Taylor's  fresh  delight 
in  natural  things :  as  Johnson  says,  he  does  not  present  pictures 
to  the  mind ;  he  "  gives  inferences  instead  of  images,  and  shows 
not  what  may  be  supposed  to  have  been  seen,  but  what  thoughts 
the  sight  might  have  suggested." 

In  his  younger  days  he  wrote  what  he  calls  "  a  shrewd  prophecy 
against  himself  "  : — 

"  Thou  neither  great  at  court,  nor  in  the"  war, 
Nor  at  the  exchange  shall  be,  nor  at  the  wrangling  bar." 

The  prophecy  was  shrewd  enough ;  such  a  born  epicurean  was  not 
likely  to  succeed  in  any  mode  of  active  life.  As  a  royal  secretary 
he  probably  discharged  his  duty  sufficiently  well,  having  the  mate- 
rial furnished  him,  and  experiencing  none  of  the  worry  of  contriv- 
ing ;  but  that  he  was  not  a  particularly  zealous  and  active  servant 
is  probably  shown  by  the  comparatively  slender  reward  settled 
upon  him  at  the  Kesto ration.  Of  his  natural  indolence  we  have  a 
very  pretty  evidence  in  his  Essays.  When  he  retired  to  the  coun- 
try, he  says  there  was  nothing  he  coveted  so  much  as  a  small  house 
and  a  large  garden,  where  he  might  work  and  study  nature ;  yet 
he  confesses,  "  I  stick  still  in  the  inn  of  a  hired  house  and  garden, 
among  weeds  and  rubbish,  and  without  that  pleasantest  work  of 
human  industry,  the  improvement  of  something  which  we  call  (not 
very  properly,  but  yet  we  call)  our  own." 

(Jowley  being  neither  a  man  of  action,  nor  a  moralist,  nor  a 


292  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

critic,  nor  an  original  student  of  science,1  his  opinions  are  not  of 
consequence  ;  in  his  humorous  railing  at  ambition  and  advocacy  of 
retirement,  he  is  moved  entirely  by  constitutional  sentiment  The 
popularity  of  his  Essays  is  a  great  tribute  to  the  intrinsic  power 
of  style, — of  manner  as  opposed  to  matter.  It  also  indicates  that 
style  can  operate  to  most  advantage  when  neither  reader  nor  writer 
is  impeded  by  difficulties  in  the  matter. 

ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — In  his  prose  writings,  the  extent  of  his  vocabulary 
is  shown  rather  by  skilful  choice  of  words  than  by  Shakspearian 
profusion.  When  we  turn  to  his  poetry,  we  see  that  his  command 
of  words,  though  great,  is  rather  inferior  for  a  writer  of  such 
reputation.  The  exertion  of  procuring  variety  would  seem  to  have 
been  too  much  for  his  easy  temperament ;  and  his  range  of  emotion 
being  so  limited,  he  did  not  accumulate  great  stores  of  language 
except  in  the  region  of  the  light  and  familiar. 

We  have  already  said  that  his  diction  is  noticeably  less  archaic 
than  the  diction  of  any  preceding  writer. 

Sentences. — In  his  lighter  compositions  the  sentence-structure  is 
easy  and  careless,  and  has  no  marked  rhythm.  But  in  his  serious 
writings  the  rhythm  is  more  even.  The  preface  to  his  poems 
published  in  1656,  and  the  Discourse  on  Cromwell,  are  written 
with  a  more  even  measure  than  any  compositions  prior  to  this 
date. 

In  Cowley  we  first  notice  very  markedly  the  habit  of  adding  to 
the  simple  -statement  an  obverse  or  inverse  statement,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  filling  out  the  cadence.  Thus,  as  an  example  of  the  obverse 
filling  out : — 

'  The  Church  of  Rome,  with  all  her  arrogance,  and  her  wide  pretences  of 
certainty  in  all  truths,  and  exemption  from  all  errors,  does  not  clap  on  this 
enchanted  armour  of  infallibility  upon  all  her  particular  subjects,  nor  is 
offended  at  the  reproof  of  her  greatest  doctors." 

As  an  example  of  the  inverse  filling  out : — 

"  A  cowardly  ranting  soldier,  an  ignorant  charlatanical  doctor,  a  foolish 
cheating  lawyer,  a  silly  pedantical  scholar,  have  always  been,  and  still  are, 
the  principal  subjects  of  all  comedies,  without  any  scandal  given  to  those 
honourable  professions,  or  even  taken  by  their  severest  professors." 

These  are  not  perhaps  the  best  examples  that  might  be  selected, 
but  they  illustrate  what  is  meant ;  other  cases  will  appear  in  sub- 
sequent quotations. 

While  in  Cowley  we  see  the  first  extensive  use  of  balanced  yet 
idiomatic  periods,  and  the  first  habitual  practice  of  the  chief  arts 

1  His  "Proposition  for  the  Advancement  of  Experimental  Philosophy"  is 
merely  a  plan  of  a  college  and  school,  and  contains  nothing  remarkable. 


ABRAHAM   COWLEY.  293 

of  rhythmical  balance,  we  must  observe  that  measured  structure 
and  point  are  employed  by  him  much  more  sparingly  than  by  their 
great  cultivator,  Samuel  Johnson.  His  rhythm  is  more  varied,  in 
this  respect  approaching  nearer  to  the  modern  standard.  Apart 
from  an  occasional  weakness  in  the  syntax,  and  a  certain  archaism 
in  the  phrase  and  in  the  thought,  the  following  reads  not  unlike  a 
good  article  in  the  '  Saturday  Review ' 1 : — 

"  As  for  all  other  objections,  which  have  been  or  may  be  made  against  the 
invention  or  elocution,  or  anything  else  which  comes  under  the  critical  juris- 
diction ;  let  it  stand  or  fall  as  it  can  answer  for  itself,  for  I  do  not  lay  the 
great  stress  of  my  reputation  upon  a  structure  of  this  nature,  much  less  upon 
the  slight  reparations  only  of  an  old  and  unfashionable  building.  There  is 
n»  writer  but  may  fail  sometimes  in  point  of  wit ;  and  it  is  no  less  frequent 
for  the  auditors  to  fail  in  point  of  judgment.  I  perceive  plainly,  by  daily 
experience,  that  Fortune  is  mistress  of  the  theatre,  as  Tully  says  it  is  of  all 
popular  assemblies.  No  man  can  tell  sometimes  from  whence  the  invisible 
winds  rise  that  move  them.  There  are  a  multitude  of  people,  who  are  truly 
and  only  spectators  at  a  play,  without  any  use  of  their  understanding;  and 
these  carry  it  sometimes  by  the  strength  of  their  numbers.  There  are  others 
who  use  their  understandings  too  much  ;  who  think  it  a  sign  of  weakness 
and  stupidity  to  let  anything  pass  by  them  unattacked,  and  that  the  honour 
of  their  judgments  (as  some  bnitals  imagine  of  their  courage)  consists  in 
quarrelling  with  everything.  We  are  therefore  wonderful  wise  men,  and 
have  a  fine  business  of  it,  we  who  spend  our  time  in  poetry  :  I  do  sometimes 
laugh,  and  am  often  angry  with  myself  when  I  think  on  it ;  and  if  I  had  a 
son  inclined  by  nature  to  the  same  folly,  I  believe  I  should  bind  him  from 
it  by  the  strictest  conjurations  of  a  paternal  blessing.  For  what  can  be 
more  ridiculous,  than  to  labour  to  give  men  delight,  whilst  they  labour,  on 
their  part,  more  earnestly  to  take  offence  ?  To  expose  one's  self  voluntarily 
and  frankly  to  all  the  dangers  of  that  narrow  passage  to  unprofitable  fame, 
which  is  defended  by  rude  multitudes  of  the  ignorant,  and  by  armed  troops 
of  the  malicious  ?  If  we  do  ill,  many  discover  it,  and  all  despise  us  ;  if  we 
do  well,  but  few  men  find  it  out,  and  fewer  entertain  it  kindly.  If  we  com- 
mit errors,  there  is  no  pardon  ;  if  we  could  do  wonders,  there  would  be  but 
little  thanks,  and  that,  too,  extorted  from  unwilling  givers." 

The  Paragraph  structure,  in  the  lighter  essays,  where  there  are 
no  natural  divisions  in  the  subject-matter,  is  loose  and  rambling. 
In  the  Prefaces,  when  he  has  distinct  topics  to  handle,  such  as 
different  books  of  poetry,  he  naturally  places  them  in  separate 
paragraphs ;  but  when  there  is  no  such  marked  guide,  he  is  not 
more  orderly  than  the  looser  sort  of  his  predecessors,  and  often 
mixes  up  several  subjects  in  the  same  paragraph.  In  the  'Crom- 
well,' the  natural  pausetfcjn  the  flow  of  his  declamation  suggest 
paragraph  breaks,  and  ^roe  sense  %pf  oratorical  effect  prevents 
rambling. 

Figures  of  Speech. — Fantastic  similitudes  are  almost  the  essence 

of  Cowley's  poetry  ;  in  his  prose  he  is  .less  exuberant.     His  prose, 

yndeed,  is  less  ornate  than  any  fine  writing  of  the  century,  prior,  at 

least,  to  his  own  date ;  the  similitudes  are  not  quite  so  numerous, 

i  From  the  Preface  to  'The  Cutter  of  Coleman  Street.' 


294  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

and  they  are  not  far-fetched,  but  seem  to  come  easily  to  hand. 
Examples  will  be  seen  in  the  quotations  that  follow.  In  the 
Essays,  which  are  familiar  productions,  he  admits  more  embel- 
lishment than  in  the  Prefaces  or  the  Discourse  ;  in  the  serious  com- 
positions, he  gives  his  care  to  elaborate  the  plain  statement  of 
striking  circumstances. 

In  declamatory  passages  he  makes  abundant  use  of  the  figures 
Exclamation  and  Interrogation.  These  will  be  exemplified  under 
the  head  of  Strength. 

QUALITIES   OF   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — The  subjects  of  the  Essays  are  easy.  Upon  ambi- 
tion, obscurity,  procrastination,  and  suchlike,  a  writer  can  hardly 
produce  new  ideas ;  all  his  powers  may  be  given  to  producing  new 
turns  of  expression,  illustrative  anecdotes,  historical  allusions.  If 
he  is  abstruse,  the  abstruseness  must  be  wholly  in  the  expression. 

Cowley's  treatment  of  his  subjects  is  gay  rather  than  grave,  and 
the  expression  is  easy  and  sprightly.  He  quotes  a  good  deal  of 
Latin,  but  he  makes  his  quotations  with  a  grace,  and,  apologising 
for  "  the  pedantry  of  a  heap  of  Latin  sentences,"  provides  us  in 
most  cases  with  fluent  translations.  The  following  on  the  Danger 
of  Procrastination  is  a  fair  specimen  : — 

' '  A  gentleman  in  our  late  civil  wars,  when  his  quarters  were  beaten  up  by 
the  enemy,  was  taken  prisoner,  and  lost  his  life  afterwards,  only  by  staying 
to  put  on  a  band,  and  adjust  his  periwig  ;  he  would  escape  like  a  person  of 
quality  or  not  at  all,  and  died  the  noble  martyr  of  ceremony  and  gentility. 
I  think  your  counsel  of  '  Festina  leute ' 1  is  as  ill  to  a  man  who  is  Hying 
from  the  world,  as  it  would  have  been  to  that  unfortunate  well-bred  gentle- 
man, who  was  so  cautious  as  not  to  fly  undeceutly  from  his  enemies;  and 
therefore  I  prefer  Horace's  advice  before  yours — 

Sapere  aude, 
Incipe — a 

Begin  ;  the  getting  out  of  doors  is  the  greatest  part  of  the  journey.     Varro 
teaches  us  that  Latin  proverb  :    .     .     .     but  to  return  to  Horace- 
Begin  ;  be  bold,  and  venture  to  be  wise ; 
He  who  defers  this  work  from  day  to  day, 
Does  on  a  river's  bank  expecting  stay, 
Till  the  whole  stream,  which  stopt  him,  should  be  gone, 
That  runs,  and  as  it  runs,  for  ever  will  run  on. 

Csesar  (the  man  of  expedition  above  all  others)  was  so  far  from  this  folly, 
that  whensoever,  in  a  journey,  he  was  to  cross  any  river,  he  never  went 
one  foot  out  of  his  way  for  a  bridge,  or  a  ford,  or  a  ferry;  but  flung  him- 
self into  it  immediately,  and  swam  over  :  and  this  is  the  course  we  ought 
to  imitate,  if  we  meet  with  any  stops  in  our  way  to  happiness.  Stay,  till  the 
waters  are  low;  stay,  till  some  boats  come  by  to  transport  you  ;  stay,  till  a 
bridge  be  built  for  you  :  you  had  even  as  good  stay,  till  the  river  be  quite 

'"Take  it  easy  ; "  lit.  "  Hasten  slowly."] 
"  Have  the  courage  to  be  wise, — begin,  * 


ABRAHAM   COWLEY.  295 

past.     Persius  (who,  you  use  to  say,  you  do  not  know  whether  he  be  a 

food  poet  or  no,  because  you  cannot  understand  him,  and  whom,  therefore, 
say,  I  know  to  be  not  a  good  poet)  has  an  odd  expression  of  these  pro- 
crastinators,  which,  methinks,  is  lull  of  fancy — 

•          •         .          » 

Our  yesterday's  to-morrow  now  is  gone, 
And  still  a  new  to-morrow  does  come  on; 
We  by  to-morrows  draw  up  all  our  store, 
Till  the  exhausted  well  can  yield  no  more. 

"  And  now,  I  think,  I  am  even  with  you,  for  your  '  Otium  cum  dignitate,' 
and  '  Festina  lente,'  and  three  or  four  other  more  of  your  new  Latin  sen- 
tences ;  if  I  should  draw  upon  you  all  my  forces  out  of  Seneca  and  Plutarch 
upon  this  subject,  I  should  overwhelm  you ;  but  I  leave  those,  as  Triarii, 
for  your  next  charge.  I  shall  only  give  you  now  a  light  skirmish  out  of  an 
epigrammatist,  your  special  good  friend  ;  and  so,  vale." 

The  above  exemplifies  the  simple  style  of  his  familiar  essays ; 
we  shall  see  that  even  in  his  most  ambitious  declamations  there  is 
a  peculiar  lightness  and  ease,  a  singular  absence  of  stiffness  and 
constraint 

Strength. — The  passage  just  quoted  from  the  Essays  is  an  example 
of  our  author's  sprightliness  and  animation.  The  passage  quoted 
before  to  show  how  modern  his  expression  is,  exemplifies  animation 
in  a  more  serious  vein,  the  animation  of  finished  brevity  and  point. 

In  some  parts  of  his  Prefaces,  and  throughout  the  Discourse  on 
Cromwell,  he  assumes  a  loftier  tone  of  declamation.  Some  of 
these  declamatory  passages  are  highly  finished.  One  of  the  finest 
of  them,  the  summary  of  the  striking  paradoxes  in  the  career  of 
Cromwell,  is  quoted  and  analysed  in  Bain's  '  Rhetoric.'  In  some 
remarks  upon  the  '  Davideis,'  he  presents  the  fortunes  of  David  in 
the  same  striking  form,  though  the  contrasts  are  not  portrayed  at 
the  same  length  : — 

"What  worthier  subject  could  have  been  chosen,  among  all  the  treasuries 
of  past  times,  than  the  life  of  this  young  prince,  who  from  so  small  begin- 
nings, through  such  infinite  troubles  and  oppositions,  by  such  miraculous 
virtues  and  excellencies,  and  with  such  incomparable  variety  of  wonderful 
actions  and  accidents,  became  the  greatest  monarch  that  ever  sat  on  the 
most  famous  throne  of  the  whole  earth  I " 

His  plea  for  dramatising  the  characters  and  incidents  of  the  Old 
Testament,  being  an  apology  for  his  own  practice,  is  written  with 
all  his  powers  of  style.  After  enumerating  the  dramatic  elements 
in  the  life  of  David,  he  continues : — 

"What  can  we  imagine  more  proper  for  the  ornaments  of  wit  or  learning 
in  the  story  of  Deucalion,  than  in  that  of  Noah  ?  Why  will  not  the  actions 
of  Sampson  afford  as  plentiful  matter  as  the  labours  of  Hercules  ?  Why  is 
not  Jeplitha's  daughter  as  good  a  woman  as  Iphigenia?  and  the  friendship 
of  David  and  Jonathan  more  worthy  celebration  than  that  of  Theseus  and 
Pirithous  ?  Does  not  the  passage  of  Moses  and  the  Israelites  into  the  Holy 
Land  yield  incomparably  more  poetical  variety  than  the  voyages  of  Ulysses 
<»r  ^Eneas  ?  Are  the  obsolete  threadbare  tales  of  Thebes  and  Troy  half  so 


296  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

Btored  with  great,  heroical,  and  supernatural  actions  (since  verse  will  needs 
find  or  make  such)  as  the  wars  of  Joshua,  of  the  Judges,  of  David,  and  divera 
others  ?  Can  all  the  transformations  of  the  gods  give  such  copious  hints  to 
flourish  and  expatiate  on,  as  the  true  miracles  of  Christ,  or  of  His  prophets 
an  J  apostles  ?  Why  do  1  instance  in  these  few  particulars  ?  All  the  books 
of  the  Bible  are  either  already  most  admirable  and  exalted  pieces  of  pi«sy, 
or  are  the  best  materials  in  the  world  for  it." 

Perhaps  the  most  effective  piece  of  rhetoric  in  all  his  composition 
is  the  passage  beginning  with  the  simile  of  "  Jack  in  the  clock- 
house."  The  melodious  solemnity  of  the  rhythm,  the  vigour  and 
propriety  of  the  language,  the  fine  similes,  and  the  imposing 
examples,  exhibit  probably  the  utmost  stretch  of  the  author's 
power : — 

"I  have  often  observed  (with  all  submission  and  resignation  of  spirit  to 
the  inscrutable  mysteries  of  Eternal  Providence)  that,  when  the  fulness  and 
maturity  of  time  is  come,  that  produces  the  great  confusions  and  changes  hi 
the  world,  it  usually  pleases  God  to  make  it  appear,  by  the  manner  of  them, 
that  they  are  not  the  effects  of  human  force  or  policy,  but  of  the  divine 
justice  and  predestination  ;  and,  though  we  see  a  man,  like  that  which  we 
call  Jack  of  the  clock-house,  striking,  as  it  were,  the  hour  of  that  fulness  of 
time,  yet  our  reason  must  needs  be  convinced  that  his  hand  is  moved  by 
some  secret,  and,  to  us  who  stand  without,  invisible  direction.  And  the 
stream  of  the  current  is  then  so  violent,  that  the  strongest  men  in  the  world 
cannot  draw  up  against  it;  and  none  are  so  weak  but  they  may  sail  down 
with  it.  These  are  the  spring-tides  of  public  affairs,  which  we  see  often 
happen,  but  seek  in  vain  to  discover  any  certain  causes.  And  one  man 
then,  by  maliciously  opening  all  the  sluices  that  he  can  come  at,  can  never 
be  the  sole  author  of  all  this  (though  he  may  be  as  guilty  as  if  really  he 
were  by  intending  and  imagining  to  be  so) ;  but  it  is  God  that  breaks  up 
the  flood-gates  of  so  general  a  deluge,  and  all  the  art  then,  and  industry  of 
mankind,  is  not  sufficient  to  raise  up  dikes  and  ramparts  against  it.  In 
such  a  time,  it  was,  as  this,  that  not  all  the  wisdom  and  power  of  the  Roman 
senate,  nor  the  wit  and  eloquence  of  Cicero,  nor  the  courage  and  virtue  of 
Brutus,  was  able  to  defend  their  country,  or  themselves,  against  the  unex- 
perienced rashness  of  a  beardless  boy,  and  the  loose  rage  of  a  voluptuous 
madman.  The  valour,  and  prudent  counsels,  on  the  one  side,  are  made 
fruitless,  and  the  errors,  and  cowardice,  on  the  other,  harmless,  by  unex- 
pected accidents.  The  one  general  saves  his  life  and  gains  the  whole  world, 
by  a  very  dream  ;  and  the  other  loses  both  at  once,  by  a  little  mistake  of 
the  shortness  of  his  sight.  And  though  this  be  not  always  so,  for  we  see 
that,  in  the  translation  of  the  great  monarchies  from  one  to  another,  it 
pleased  God  to  make  choice  of  the  most  eminent  men  in  nature,  as  Cyrus, 
Alexander,  Scipio,  and  his  contemporaries,  for  his  chief  instruments,  ami 
actors,  in  so  admirable  a  work  (the  end  of  this  being,  not  only  to  destroy  or 
punish  one  nation,  which  may  be  done  by  the  worst  of  mankind,  but  to 
exalt  and  bless  another,  which  is  only  to  be  effected  by  great  and  virtuous 
persons) ;  yet,  when  God  only  intends  the  temporary  chastisement  of  a 
people,  he  does  not  raise  up  his  servant  Cyrus  (as  he  himself  is  pleased  to 
call  him),  or  an  Alexander  (who  had  as  many  virtues  to  do  good,  as  vices  to 
do  harm) ;  but  he  makes  the  Massaniellos,  and  the  Johns  of  Leyden,  the 
instruments  of  his  vengeance,  that  the  power  of  the  Almighty  might  be 
more  evident  by  the  weakness  of  the  means  which  he  chooses  to  demonstrate 
it.  He  did  not  assemble  the  serpents,  and  the  monsters  of  Afric,  to  correct 


ABRAHAM   COWLEY.  297 

the  pride  of  the  Egyptians ;  but  called  for  his  armies  of  locusts  out  of  Ethi- 
opia, and  formed  new  ones  of  vermin  out  of  the  very  dust ;  and,  because 
you  see  a  whole  country  destroyed  by  these,  will  you  argue  from  thence 
they  must  needs  have  had  both  the  craft  of  foxes,  and  the  courage  of 
lions ! " 

Wit  and  Humour. — Wit  and  humour  are  undoubtedly  the  ruling 
features  of  Cowley's  prose.  His  ridicule  is  for  the  most  part  gay 
and  genial  Here  and  there  we  meet  with  passages  of  keen  satire ; 
but  there  is  nothing  approaching  to  personal  spleen  in  his  sar- 
casms. In  his  bitterest  shots  at  Cromwell,  he  keeps  in  view 
rather  what  he  supposed  to  be  Cromwell's  vices — tyrannous  am- 
bition and  hypocrisy.  The  man  himself  he  admits  to  be  an  extra- 
ordinary person,  and  professes  to  look  upon  him  with  no  greater 
animosity  than  upon  Marius  or  Sylla.  Besides,  the  invective  is 
supposed  to  be  delivered  in  a  dream,  and  to  the  face  of  a  terrible 
angel  professing  to  be  an  admirer  of  the  late  Lord  Protector.  The 
circumstances  are  managed  with  a  kind  of  comic  effect ;  and,  keep- 
ing in  mind  the  situation,  we  see  the  most  bitter  invective  through 
a  humorous  medium. 

As  an  example  of  his  powers  of  sarcastic  irony,  take  the  follow- 
ing ludicrously  unexpected  banter  by  the  terrible  apparition,  the 
"North-West  Principality."  Cowley  had  been  proceeding  in  a 
full  tide  of  denunciation,  accusing  Cromwell  of  tyranny,  craft, 
and  other  crimes: — 

"Here  I  stopt ;  and  my  pretended  protector,  who,  I  expected,  should 
have  been  very  angry,  fell  a-laughiug  ;  it  seems  at  the  simplicity  of  my  dis- 
course, for  thus  he  replied  :  '  You  seem  to  pretend  extremely  to  the  old 
obsolete  rules  of  virtue  and  conscience,  which  makes  me  doubt  very  much, 
whether,  from  this  vast  prospect  of  three  kingdoms,  you  can  show  me  any 
acres  of  your  own.  But  these  are  so  far  from  making  you  a  prince,  that  I 
am  afraid  your  friends  will  never  have  the  contentment  to  see  you  so  much 
as  a  justice  of  peace  in  your  own  country.  For  this,  I  perceive,  which  you 
call  virtue,  is  nothing  else  but  either  the  forwardness  of  a  Cynic,  or  the 
laziness  of  an  Epicurean.  I  am  glad  you  allow  me  at  least  artful  dissimula- 
tion, and  unwearied  diligence  in  my  hero ;  and  I  assure  you  that  he,  whose 
life  is  constantly  drawn  by  these  two,  shall  never  be  misled  out  of  the  way 
of  greatness.  But  I  see  you  are  a  pedant,  and  Platonical  statesman,  a  theo- 
retical commonwealth's-man,  an  Utopian  dreamer.  Was  ever  riches  gotten 
by  your  golden  mediocrities  ?  or  the  supreme  place  attained  to  by  virtues 
that  must  not  stir  out  of  the  middle  ?  Do  you  study  Aristotle's  politics, 
and  write,  if  you  please,  comments  upon  them ;  and  let  another  but  practise 
Machiavel :  and  let  us  see,  then,  which  of  you  two  will  come  to  the  greatest 
preferments.  If  the  desire  of  rule  and  superiority,'  "  &c. 

The  satire  of  the  Essays  is  never  long  kept  up;  some  good- 
Lumoured  familiarity  of  expression  comes  in  after  a  short  passage 
of  keener  language,  and  puts  us  into  a  humorous  mood  by  reveal- 
ing the  easy  unexcited  temper  of  the  satirist.  Thus,  in  the  Essay 
on  Obscurity  : — 


298  FROM   1640   TO   1670. 

"  If  we  engnge  into  a  large  acquaintance  and  various  familiarities,  we  set 
open  our  gates  to  the  invaders  of  most  of  our  time  :  we  expose  our  life  to  a 
quotidian  ogne  of  frigid  impertinencies,  which  would  make  a  wise  man 
tremble  to  think  of.  Now,  as  for  being  known  much  by  sight  and  pointed 
at,  I  cannot  comprehend  the  honour  that  lies  in  that :  whatsoever  it  be, 
every  mountebank  has  it  more  than  the  best  doctor,  and  the  hangman  more 
than  the  lord  chief  justice  of  a  city.  Every  creature  has  it,  both  of  nature 
and  art,  if  it  be  any  ways  extraordinary.  It  was  as  often  said,  '  This  is  that 
15ueephalus,'  or  'This  is  that  Iiicitatus,'  when  they  were  led  prancing 
through  the  streets,  as  'This  is  that  Alexander,'  or  'This  is  that  Doiui- 
tian  ; '  and  truly,  for  the  latter,  I  take  Incitatus  to  have  been  a  much  more 
honourable  beast  than  his  master,  and  more  deserving  the  consulship,  than 
he  the  empire." 

He  can  be  humorous  at  his  own  expense,  as  in  the  description 
of  his  country  experiences  : — 

"One  would  think  that  all  mankind  had  bound  themselves  by  an  oath 
to  do  all  the  wickedness  they  can  ;  that  they  had  all  (as  the  Scripture 
speaks)  sold  themselves  to  sin:  the  difference  only  is,  that  some  are  a  little 
more  crafty  (and  but  a  little,  God  knows)  in  making  of  the  bargain.  I 
thought,  when  I  went  first  to  dwell  in  the  country,  that,  without  doubt,  I 
should  have  met  there  with  the  simplicity  of  the  old  poetical  golden  age  ;  I 
thought  to  have  found  no  inhabitants  there,  but  such  as  the  shepherds  of 
Sir  Philip  Sidney  in  Arcadia,  or  of  Monsieur  d'Urfe,  upon  the  banks  of 
Lignon  ;  and  began  to  consider  with  myself,  which  way  I  might  recommend 
no  less  to  posterity  the  happiness  and  innocence  of  the  men  of  Chertsea ; 
but  to  confess  the  truth,  I  perceived  quickly,  by  infallible  demonstrations, 
that  I  was  still  in  Old  England,  and  not  in  Arcadia,  or  La  Forrest ;  that, 
if  I  could  not  content  myself  with  anything  less  than  exact  fidelity  in  human 
conversation,  I  had  almost  as  good  go  back  and  seek  for  it  in  the  Court,  or 
the  Exchange,  or  Westminster-hall.  I  ask  again  then,  whither  shall  we  fly, 
or  what  shall  we  do  I" 

The  Essay  on  Agriculture  is  written  in  his  happiest  vein.  He 
searches  out  the  authorities  for  the  dignity  of  agricultural  life 
with  great  pleasantry  : — 

"  From  Homer,  we  must  not  expect  much  concerning  our  affairs.  He 
was  blind,  and  could  neither  work  in  the  country,  nor  enjoy  the  pleasures 
of  it ;  his  helpless  poverty  was  likeliest  to  be  sustained  in  the  richest  places; 
lie  was  to  delight  the  Grecians  with  fine  tales  of  the  wars  and  adventures  of 
their  ancestors ;  his  subject  removed  him  from  all  commerce  with  us,  and 
yet,  methinks,  he  made  a  shift  to  show  his  goodwill  a  little.  For  though 
he  could  do  us  no  honour  in  the  person  of  his  hero  Ulysses  (much  less  of 
Achilles),  because  his  whole  time  was  consumed  in  wars  and  voyages ;  yet 
he  makes  his  father  Laertes  a  gardener  all  that  while,  and  seeking  his  con- 
solation for  the  absence  of  his  son  in  the  pleasure  of  planting,  and  even 
dunging  his  own  grounds.  Ye  see,  he  did  not  contemn  us  peasants  ;  nay, 
so  far  was  he  from  that  insolence,  that  he  always  styles  Eumaeus,  who  kept 
the  hogs,  with  wonderful  respect,  Slav  v<j>opl3oi>,  the  divine  swine-herd :  he 
could  have  done  no  more  for  Menelaus  or  Agamemnon." 

OTHER  WRITERS. 

The  justification  of  departing  from  the  usual  chronological 
arrangement,  which  dates  a  period  from  the  Restoration,  is  that 


THEOLOGY.  299 

by  the  present  arrangement  we  get  a  more  compact  grouping  of 
our  authors  relatively  to  the  great  Rebellion.  By  annexing  to 
the  period  of  the  Commonwealth  the  first  ten  years  of  the  reign 
of  Charles  II.,  we  bind  together  those  that  wrote  during  the 
agitation  of  the  political  storm,  and  those  whose  literary  activity 
was  greatest,  indeed,  when  that  storm  was  laid,  but  whose  thoughts 
and  style  were  powerfully  influenced  by  the  experience  of  their 
early  manhood,  and  who  belong  in  every  way  to  the  generation  of 
the  Commonwealth. 

The  writers  of  the  Commonwealth — and  they  are  remarkably 
numerous  —  may,  indeed,  be  divided  into  three  classes :  recluse 
or  easy-tempered  students,  like  Thomas  Browne  and  Fuller,  who 
were  hardly  influenced  at  all  by  the  surrounding  excitement ; 
men  of  bold  speech,  like  Milton,  who  made  their  voices  heard  in 
the  strife;  and  men,  like  Cowley,  who  composed  their  works 
when  the  agitation  had  subsided.  The  division  is  more  a  loose 
help  to  the  understanding  and  the  memory  than  one  that  can 
be  marked  out  with  sharp  and  clear  lines :  it  makes  an  interesting 
distribution  of  a  few  great  men,  and  it  is  so  far  a  clue  to  their 
character ;  but  it  cannot  be  made  a  principle  of  classification  for 
the  mass  of  writers  without  leading  to  unprofitable  refinements. 
We  here  follow  the  same  plan  as  for  the  other  periods. 

THEOLOGY. 

Hall,  Hales,  and  Chillingworth,  all  survived  into  this  period. 
The  Church  of  England  boasted  also  two  of  her  most  famous 
divines,  Robert  Sanderson  (1587-1663),  and  John  Pearson  (1613- 
1686).  At  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War,  Sanderson  was  Regius 
Professor  of  Divinity  at  Oxford,  Canon  of  Christ  Church,  and  a 
royal  chaplain.  Upon  the  Restoration  he  was  appointed  Bishop 
of  Lincoln,  and  he  was  one  of  the  commissioners  at  the  Savoy 
Conference  in  1661.  His  principal  work  in  English  is  'Niue 
Casts  of  Conscience.'  He  is  the  chief  of  Protestant  casuists. 
Pearson,  who  after  the  Restoration  succeeded  Dr  Wilkins  in  the 
Mastership  of  Trinity  and  in  the  see  of  Chester,  published  in  1659 
an  'Exposition  of  the  Creed,'  which  still  holds  its  ground  as  a 
standard  production.  The  work  is  laborious,  calm,  and  acute, 
written  in  simple  and  clear  language ;  it  follows  the  easy  arrange- 
ment of  taking  each  word  in  order.  He  was  profoundly  versed  in 
patristic  literature ;  and  in  that  department  criticised  with  such 
acuteness  that  Bentley  said  "  his  very  dross  was  gold." 

The  most  eminent  of  the  Nonconforming  divines  of  this  gene- 
ration was  Richard  Baxter  (1615-1691).  He  was  ordained  in  the 
Church  of  England,  and  at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  War  was 
pastor  of  Kidderminster.  He  sided  with  the  Parliament,  was 


300  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

attached  as  chaplain  to  a  regiment,  and  saw  some  active  service 
but  his  health  failing,  he  returned  to  his  pastoral  charge,  and 
buried  himself  in  study.  In  this  retirement  he  wrote  the  'Saint's 
Everlasting  Rest,'  a  volume  of  pious  thoughts  that  have  a  peculiar 
interest  when  we  view  them  as  the  aspirations  of  an  infirm  man 
turning  wearily  from  the  distractions  of  a  time  so  utterly  out  of 
joint.  The  violent  breaking  to  pieces  of  the  old  monarchy  and 
the  usurpation  of  Cromwell  were  painful  things  to  a  man  thirsting 
for  quiet  and  security ;  and  in  a  celebrated  interview  with  the 
Protector  he  had  the  courage  to  remonstrate.  After  the  Restora- 
tion he  was  offered  a  bishopric,  but  declined  the  offer.  Subse- 
quently, when  penal  enactments  were  passed  against  Dissenters, 
his  quiet  ministrations  in  London  were  interfered  with,  and  he 
was  exposed  to  considerable  hardships.  At  last,  in  1685,  he  was 
thrown  into  prison,  taken  before  the  infamous  Judge  Jeffreys,  and 
shamefully  bullied :  he  was  released  by  the  special  intervention  of 
the  King.  All  his  life  through  he  was  an  indefatigable  writer :  of 
his  multitudinous  works,  numbering  in  all  168,  only  the  'Saint's 
flest '  and  the  '  Call  to  the  Unconverted '  have  had  a  durable  popu- 
larity. His  autobiography — '  Memorable  Passages  of  my  Life  and 
Times' — affords  an  interesting  picture  of  an  ardent  impulsive 
nature  tamed  down  by  rude  experience  and  infirm  health  to 
greater  sobriety  of  judgment  and  closeness  of  observation.  In  the 
following  passage  he  frankly  owns  that  had  his  works  been  less 
numerous,  their  fame  might  have  been  more  durable : — 

"Concerning  almost  all  my  writings,  I  must  confess  that  my  judgment 
is,  that  fewer,  well  studied  and  polished,  had  heen  better ;  but  the  reader 
who  can  safely  censure  the  books,  is  not  fit  to  censure  the  author,  unless  he 
had  been  upon  the  place,  and  acquainted  with  all  the  occasions  and  circum- 
stances. Indeed,  for  the  'Saint's  Rest,'  I  had  four  months'  vacancy  to 
write  it,  but  in  the  midst  of  continual  languishing  and  medicine ;  but,  for 
the  rest,  I  wrote  them  in  the  crowd  of  all  my  other  employments,  which 
would  allow  me  no  great  leisure  for  polishing  and  exactness,  or  any  orna- 
ment ;  so  that  I  scarce  ever  wrote  one  sheet  twice  over,  nor  stayed  to  make 
any  blots  or  interlining,  but  was  fain  to  let  it  go  as  it  was  first  conceived ; 
and  when  my  own  desire  was  rather  to  stay  upon  one  thing  long  than  run 
over  many,  some  sudden  occasions  or  other  extorted  almost  all  my  writings 
from  me. " 

Another  eminent  Dissenter  was  John  Owen  (1616-1683),  first  a 
Presbyterian,  thereafter  an  Independent.  He  was  a  man  of  singular 
moderation  and  sweetness  of  temper.  He  was  a  special  favourite 
with  Cromwell,  who  took  him  to  Ireland  to  organise  the  College 
of  Dublin,  and  subsequently  to  Scotland.  After  the  Restoration, 
Clarendon  offered  him  preferment  in  the  Church  if  he  would  con- 
form, and  Charles  himself  desired  his  acquaintance.  His  volu- 
minous writings  are  exclusively  on  religious  subjects.  The  style 
is  bad.  "  I  can't  think  how  you  like  Dr  Owen,"  said  Robert  Hall 


JOHN  BUNYAN.  301 

"I  can't  read  him  with  patience  ;  I  never  read  a  page  of  Dr  Owen, 
sir,  without  finding  some  confusion  in  his  thoughts,  either  a  truism 
or  a  contradiction  in  terms.'  "  Sir,  he  is  a  double  Dutchman, 
floundering  in  a  continent  of  mud." 

Less  accommodating  and  pliable,  less  sweet  if  not  less  enlight- 
ened, was  George  Fox  (1624-1690),  the  Founder  of  the  Society  of 
Friends,  an  illegitimate  son  of  the  Church  in  a  time  of  religions 
excitement,  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  men  of  genius  in  this 
eccentric  generation.  He  was  a  grave,  sober,  reflective  man,  with 
no  outgoings  of  volatile  imagination,  buoyant  egotism,  or  healthy 
energy  in  any  shape;  as  passive,  unexcited,  vacuous,  as  Bunyan 
was  active,  excitable,  teeming  with  creative  energy, — not  pouring 
out  force,  but  letting  the  world  flow  in  upon  him,  judging  and 
measuring  the  traditions  and  opinions  floating  about  him,  and 
striving  in  a  calm  way  to  reduce  the  bewildering  mass  to  consistent 
clearness.  Probably  the  more  he  pondered,  the  more  he  entangled 
himself  in  perplexing  mazes,  and  he  finally  ceased  to  ponder,  and 
took  refuge  in  a  set  of  arbitrary  dogmas.  He  originated  the  promi- 
nent ideas  of  Quakerism,  the  use  of  "  thou,"  the  objection  to  un- 
cover the  head  before  dignitaries,  the  objection  to  oaths,  the  aver- 
sion to  war,  the  doctrine  that  inner  light  and  not  the  Bible  is  the 
rule  of  life.  Like  Bunyan  he  was  an  illiterate  artisan  of  an  in- 
ferior craft,  a  cobbler  or  shoe-mender — holding  to  the  shoemaker 
the  same  relation  that  the  tinker  holds  to  the  brazier.  His  style 
is  more  compact,  and  has  greater  graphic  felicity  of  plain  language, 
than  Bunyan's,  but  it  has  none  of  the  Pilgrim's  figurative  richness. 

Another  character  of  the  time,  of  wider  reputation  than  George 
Fox,  was  the  man  just  mentioned,  John  Bunyan  (1628-1688),  "  the 
wicked  tinker  of  Elstow."  We  need  not  dwell  upon  the  incidents 
of  his  early  life  and  conversion,  minutely  and  vividly  related  in  his 
autobiographic  'Grace  Abounding  to  the  Chief  of  Sinners.'  His 
later  biographers  accuse  himself  and  his  early  biographers  of  exag- 
gerating his  youthful  enormities  by  way  of  magnifying  the  divine 
grace.  He  says  himself  that  "  he  did  still  let  loose  the  reins  of 
his  lust,  and  delighted  in  all  transgressions  against  the  law  of  God ; 
so  that  until  he  came  to  the  state  of  marriage,  he  was  the  very 
ringleader  in  all  manner  of  vice  and  ungodliness."  The  only  sina 
that  he  specifically  confesses  to  are  Sabbath-breaking  and  swear- 
ing. From  another  sin  pretty  plainly  stated  in  the  above  passage, 
Southey,  followed  by  Macaulay,  exculpates  him  on  the  ground  of 
a  subsequent  specific  denial — exculpates  him  somewhat  hastily ; 
for  though  the  natural  interpretation  of  one  plain-spoken  sentence 
is  that  the  denial  covers  his  whole  life,  yet,  when  we  reflect  and 
look  closely,  we  see  that  the  charge  was  pointed  at  his  conduct 
after  conversion  and  marriage,  and  that,  in  the  course  of  his  in- 
dignant denial,  he  brings  in  the  qualifying  clause,  u  from  my  first 


302  FROM    1640   TO   1670. 

conversion  until  now,"  and  so  does  not  contradict  his  previous 
confession  that  he  was  not  better  than  he  should  have  been  before 
lie  "came  to  the  state  of  marriage."  "After  he  had  been  about 
five  or  six  years  awakened,"  "  he  was  desired,  and  that  with  much 
earnestness,  that  he  would  be  willing  at  sometimes  to  take  in  hand, 
in  one  of  the  meetings,  to  speak  a  word  of  exhortation  unto  them;" 
and  with  much  private  irresolution,  he  consented  to  their  request, 
and  "  discovered  his  gift  amongst  them  "  with  such  effect  that 
after  a  time  he  "  was  more  particularly  called  forth,  and  appointed 
to  a  more  ordinary  and  public  preaching  of  the  Word."  Five 
years  after  his  ordination,  in  1660,  he  was  apprehended  under  the 
Conventicle  Act  of  the  restored  Government,  taken  before  the 
quarter-sessions,  and  "  indicted  for  an  upholder  and  maintainer  of 
unlawful  assemblies  and  conventicles,  and  for  not  conforming  to 
the  national  worship  of  the  Church  of  England ;  and  after  some 
conference  there  with  the  justices,  they,  taking  his  plain-dealing 
with  them  for  a  confession,  as  they  termed  it,  of  the  indictment, 
did  sentence  him  to  a  perpetual  banishment,  because  he  refused  to 
conform.  So  being  again  delivered  up  to  the  gaoler's  hands,  he 
was  had  home  to  prison,  and  there  lay  complete  twelve  years, 
waiting  to  see  what  God  would  suffer  those  men  to  do  with  him." 
During  this  long  imprisonment,  the  latter  half  of  which  was 
very  lenient  and  virtually  no  imprisonment  at  all,  he  began  the 
'  Pilgrim's  Progress.'  After  he  was  set  at  liberty,  he  was  chosen 
pastor  of  the  Dissenters  at  Bedford,  and  lived  there  for  the  most 
part,  preaching  by  stealth  and  visiting  the  dwellings  of  his  flock. 
When  in  1687  the  penal  laws  against  Dissenters  were  relaxed,  a 
church  was  built  for  him  at  Bedford,  and  attended  by  multitudes 
from  all  parts  of  the  neighbourhood.  He  was  particularly  noted 
for  his  tact  in  reconciling  differences,  and  often  was  called  long 
journeys  for  that  purpose.  One  of  those  benevolent  errands  was 
the  indirect  cause  of  his  death  ;  he  caught  cold  from  exposure,  and 
died  of  fever  on  the  izth  of  August  1688.  His  principal  work, 
besides  the  '  Pilgrim's  Progress '  and  '  Grace  Abounding,'  is  the 

*  Holy  War,'  an  account  of  the  fall  and  redemption  of  mankind 
under  figure  of  a  war  waged  by  Satan  for  the  possession  of  the 
town  of  MansouL     His  immense  popularity  was  not  posthumous ; 
he  rose  into  fame  before  his  death.     "  The  '  Pilgrim's  Progress,'  " 
says  Macaulay,  "  stole  silently  into  the  world.     Not  a  single  copy 
of  the  first  edition  is  known  to  be  in  existence.     The  year  of  pub- 
lication has  not  been  ascertained.     It  is  probable  that  during  some 
months  the  little  volume  circulated  only  among  poor  and  obscure 
sectaries.     .     .     .     In   1678  came  forth  a  second  edition  with 
additions ;  and  then  the  demand  became  immense.     In  the  four 
following  years  the  book  was  reprinted  six  times.      The  eighth 

*  tition,  which  contains  the  last  improvements  made  by  the  author 


JOHN   BUN  VAN.  303 

was  published  in  1682,  the  ninth  in  1684,  the  tenth  in  1685."  In 
learned  circles  doubts  were  expressed  whether  a  poor  ignorant 
tinker  could  be  the  author  of  such  a  work;  which  doubts  he  re- 
futed by  publishing  the  second  part  in  1684.  In  his  metrical 
preface  to  the  '  Holy  War,'  which  followed  soon  after,  he  strongly 
asserted  his  originality — declaring  that  "  None  in  all  the  world, 
without  a  lie,  can  say  that  this  is  mine,  excepting  L"  The  char- 
acter of  such  a  man  is  an  interesting  study.  Many  of  his  pecu- 
liarities lie  upon  the  surface.  He  was  naturally  of  vehement, 
ardent  temper ;  we  need  not  the  evidence  of  his  early  habits  to 
assure  us  that  his  temper  was  one  that  an  oath  gave  a  natural 
relief  to.  He  was  often  conscious  of  an  uncontrollable  impulse  to 
blaspheme  and  imprecate.  The  imagination  that  reared  the  won- 
derful fabric  of  his  allegories  rendered  his  youth  miserable  by  its 
ungovernable  activity  in  creating  images  of  fear ;  at  times  he  was 
as  full  of  terrible  apprehensions  as  a  horse  in  a  forest  at  midnight. 
It  was  part  of  the  impulsive  nature  of  the  man  that  he  could  not 
refrain  from  acting  upon  his  fancies  with  the  force  of  belief ;  he 
would  turn  aside  from  a  house  under  the  strength  of  a  sudden 
apprehension  that  it  would  fall  upon  him.  Not  until  he  had 
obtained  assurance  of  God's  favour  was  this  imaginative  energy 
turned  into  more  profitable  channels.  Once  released  from  his 
fearful  anticipations  of  the  wrath  of  God,  his  active  mind  found 
employment  in  new  directions.  We  are  apt  to  view  him  too  ex- 
clusively as  the  author  of  the  '  Pilgrim's  Progress,'  and  to  search 
there,  and  there  only,  for  the  signs  of  his  intellectual  power.  In 
addition  to  the  abundant  evidence  therein  exhibited  of  his  power 
of  entering  into  the  thoughts  and  feelings  of  men  in  different  cir- 
cumstances, we  may  glean  significant  particulars  here  and  there 
in  the  records  of  his  life.  There  is  a  telling  hint  of  his  restless 
versatility  in  the  catalogue  of  "  abominations  "  that  to  the  last  he 
"  found  in  his  heart "  ;  in  the  "  inclining  to  unbelief,"  in  the 
"  wanderings  and.,  coldness  in  prayer,"  and  in  the  being  "  apt  to 
murmur  because  he  had  no  more,  and  yet  ready  to  abuse  what  he 
had."  And  what  better  testimony  could  there  be  to  penetration 
and  address  than  his  fame  in  later  life  as  a  mediator  in  family 
quarrels  1  Imaginative  power  and  knowledge  of  men  (which  may 
be  said  to  be  different  aspects  of  the  constructive  faculty)  are  the 
main  secrets  of  his  success  as  a  writer.  Perhaps  too  much  has 
been  made  of  his  style,  viewed  merely  as  written  composition. 
His  language  is  simple  and  often  forcible,  and,  particularly  in 
4  Grace  Abounding,'  has  a  soft  melodious  flow.  The  most  pleasing 
element  is  the  graphic  force  of  the  similitudes.  And  this  is  almost 
all  that  can  be  said.  Macaulay's  estimate  is  expressed  with  char- 
acteristic slap-dash  extravagance :  "  No  writer  has  said  more 
exactly  what  he  meant  to  say.  For  magnificence,  for  pathos,  for 


304  FROM   1640  TO    1670. 

vehement  exhortation,  for  subtle  disquisition,  for  every  purpose 
of  the  poet,  the  orator,  and  the  divine,  this  homely  dialect — the 
dialect  of  plain  working  men — was  perfectly  sufficient.  There  is 
no  book  in  our  literature  on  which  we  would  so  readily  stake  the 
fame  of  the  old  unpolluted  English  language,  no  book  which  shows 
so  well  how  rich  that  language  is  in  its  own  proper  wealth,  and 
how  little  it  has  been  improved  by  all  that  it  has  borrowed." 
Even  the  assertion  that  "  the  vocabulary  is  the  vocabulary  of  the 
common  people  "  is  inconsiderate  and  erroneous.  The  language 
is  homely,  indeed,  but  it  is  not  the  everyday  speech  of  hinds  and 
tinkers ;  it  is  the  language  of  the  Church,  of  the  Bible,  of  Foxe's 
'  Book  of  Martyrs,'  and  whatever  other  literature  Bunyan  was  in 
the  habit  of  perusing.  As  for  the  "  old  unpolluted  English  lan- 
guage," it  needs  no  microscopical  eye  to  detect  in  the  '  Pilgrim's 
Progress '  a  considerable  sprinkling  of  vulgar  provincialisms,  and 
even  of  such  Latin  idioms  as  are  to  be  found  in  his  favourite 
old  martyrologist  Foxe. 

Two  other  devotional  writers  of  this  period  retain  their  hold 
on  pious  readers,  especially  among  the  lower  orders :  Samuel 
Rutherford  (1600-1661),  a  Scotch  minister  (author  of  the  'Trial 
and  Triumph  of  Faith ') ;  and  Sir  Matthew  Hale  (1609-1676),  an 
English  judge  (author  of  '  Contemplations,  Moral  and  Divine'). 


HISTORY. 

The  great  historian  of  the  period  was  Edward  Hyde,  Lord 
Clarendon  (1609-1674),  who  had  some  share  in  making  material 
for  the  history  that  he  wrote.  The  son  of  a  country  gentleman, 
he  was  bred  to  the  law  and  in  1640  began  his  public  career  in 
Parliament.  He  supported  the  moderate  opposition  to  the  arbi- 
trary measures  of  the  King ;  but  when  Parliament  raised  its  tone 
and  demanded  the  abolition  of  Episcopacy,  he  went  over  to  the 
King's  party.  He  accompanied  the  Prince  and  the  Queen-mother 
to  France.  After  the  Restoration,  which  was  brought  about  chiefly 
by  his  skilful  management,  he  was  appointed  Chancellor ;  but  in 
the  course  of  a  few  years  he  became  unpopular  both  with  the  King 
and  with  the  people,  and  in  1667  he  was  impeached  of  high  treason 
by  the  Commons,  ordered  by  the  King  to  quit  the  kingdom,  and 
pursued  by  the  Lords  with  a  bill  of  banishment.  He  was  never 
permitted  to  return ;  he  spent  four  years  of  his  exile  at  Montpel- 
lier,  and  the  remaining  three  years  at  Rouen.  It  was  during  his 
two  periods  of  exile  that  he  composed  his  various  works.  His 
'  History  of  the  Grand  Rebellion '  was  begun  at  Jersey — his  first 
place  of  refuge  on  the  failure  of  the  King's  cause — and  completed 
during  his  final  banishment.  His  '  Life  and  Continuation  of  the 
History'  was  published  from  his  manuscripts  in  1759.  He  wrote, 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITERS  305 

besides,  several  brief  works  now  fallen  into  neglect.  He  seems  to 
have  been  a  man  of  great  practical  sagacity  and  singular  tenacity 
of  purpose — a  hard,  austere,  and,  on  the  whole,  upright  man  ;  too 
unyielding  and  too  little  disposed  to  regard  the  feelings  of  others. 
His  manner  was  reserved  and  dictatorial  He  comments  upon  tin 
transactions  of  the  time  from  his  own  point  of  view,  animadvert 
ing  severely  upon  the  enemies  of  the  King ;  but  it  is  universally 
allowed  that  he  wrote  with  a  high-principled  regard  for  truth  :  he 
was  probably  too  magnanimous,  too  loftily  convinced  of  the  ri^ht 
of  his  own  cause,  to  seek  to  pervert  the  facts.  His  style  is  dry 
and  rather  prolix.  In  the  history  our  interest  is  drawn  chiefly  to 
the  judgments  of  men  and  measures;  the  veteran  politician  was  a 
penetrating  observer,  and  his  estimates  of  character  and  motive 
will  always  attract  readers  to  his  work. 

Two  minor  historians  deserve  a  passing  mention.  Thomas  May 
(15951650)  —  commended  by  Dr  Johnson  as  one  of  the  earliest 
English  writers  of  Latin  verse  able  "  to  contest  the  palm  with  any 
other  of  the  lettered  nations  " — was  secretary  to  the  Parliament, 
and  published  in  1647  '  T^6  History  of  the  Parliament  of  England 
which  began  November  3,  1640.'  Arthur  Wilson  (15%- 1652), 
secretary  to  the  Parliamentary  General  Essex,  left  a  work  on  '  The 
Life  and  Reign  of  James  I.' 

The  two  chief  antiquaries  were  Sir  William  Dugdale  (1605- 
1686),  and  his  son-in-law  Elias  Ashmole  (1617-1692). 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

James  Howell  (1596-1666),  a  versatile  writer  of  dictionaries, 
grammars,  histories,  biographies,  poems,  and  political  pamphlets, 
is  now  known  chiefly  as  the  author  of  the  first  volume  ot  '  Familiar 
Letters '  in  our  language.  Howell  had  something  of  the  versatile 
activity  of  Defoe :  like  Defoe  he  travelled  on  the  Continent  for 
commercial  purposes,  and  like  Defoe  he  was  often  employed  on 
political  missions.  Only,  Howell  had  less  power  than  the  later 
adventurer,  and  was  less  intensely  political,  observing  men  good- 
humouredly,  and  recording  his  observations  with  sparkling  live- 
liness. As  an  example  of  the  purposely  familiar  strain  of  his  let- 
ters, take  his  account  of  the  rise  of  the  Presbyterians,  in  a  letter 
written  from  the  Fleet  prison  to  a  grave  inquirer : — 

"The  first  broacher  of  the  presbyterian  religion,  and  who  made  it  differ 
from  that  of  Rome  and  Luther,  was  Calvin  ;  who  being  once  banished 
Geneva  was  revoked,  at  which  time,  he  no  less  petulantly  than  profanely 
applied  to  himself  that  text  of  the  holy  prophet  which  was  meaned  of  Christ, 
The  stone  which  the  builders  refuted,  is  made  the  headstone  of  the  corner,  <L-c. 
Thus  Geneva  lake  swallowed  up  the  episcopal  sea,  and  church  lands  were 
made  secular;  which  was  the  white  they  levelled  at.  This  Geneva  bird  flew 
thence  to  France,  and  hatched  the  Hugonots,  which  make  about  the  tenth 
part  of  that  people.  It  took  wing  also  to  Bohemia  and  Germany  high  and 

U 


306  FROM    1640  TO   1670. 

low,  as  the  Palatinate,  the  land  of  Hesse,  and  the  confederate  province"  of 
the  states  of  Holland,  whence  it  took  flight  to  Scotland  and  England.  It 
took  first  footing  in  Scotland,  when  King  James  was  a  child  in  his  cradle ; 
but  when  he  came  to  understand  himself,  and  was  manumitted  from 
Buchanan,  he  grew  cold  in  it ;  and  being  come  to  England,  he  utterly  dis- 
claimed it,  terming  it  in  a  public  speech  of  his  to  the  |>arliainent  a  sect, 
rather  than  a  religion.  To  this  sect  may  be  imputed  all  the  sidssures  that 
have  happened  in  Christianity,  with  most  of  the  wars  that  have  lacerated 
poor  Europe  ever  since  ;  and  it  may  be  called  the  source  of  the  civil  distrac- 
tions that  now  afflict  this  poor  island. " 

Howell,  as  is  evident  from  the  above,  was  a  royalist :  and  when 
he  wrote  it,  he  lay  in  prison  by  order  of  the  Parliament. 

When  Fuller's  '  Church  History '  was  published,  it  was  attacked 
by  a  somewhat  flippant  and  self-confident  controversialist,  Peter 
Heylin  (1600-1662),  author  of  a  '  History  of  the  Reformation  in 
England.'  Heylin  began  to  write  at  an  early  age,  publishing 
*  Microcosmus ;  or,  a  Description  of  the  World,'  a  popular  geo- 
graphical work,  in  1621 ;  and  to  the  end  of  his  life  he  continued 
a  prolific  and  varied  writer.  In  1625  he  published  an  account  of 
a  six  weeks'  tour  in  France — a  very  flippant  aud  superficial  affair, 
with  occasional  dashes  of  clever  expression.  .  In  his  history  he  is 
a  bitter  partisan  on  the  royalist  side.  He  was  in  holy  orders,  and 
is  said  to  have  died  partly  of  chagrin  at  not  being  recognised  after 
the  Restoration. 

John  Earle  (1601-1665),  chaplain  and  tutor  to  Prince  Charles  IL, 
appointed  at  the  Restoration  Bishop  of  Worcester,  and  subsequently 
promoted  to  Salisbury,  followed  in  the  wake  of  Overbury,  Dekker, 
and  others,  as  a  writer  of  essays  and  characters.  His  '  Microcos- 
mography;  or,  a  Piece  of  the  World  discovered  in  Essays  and 
Characters,'  was  published  about  1628,  and  became  popular.  An 
eleventh  edition  was  printed  in  1811.  The  characters  are  such  as 
an  Antiquary,  a  Carrier,  a  Country  Fellow,  a  University  Dun. 
He  writes  in  the  same  punning  antithetical  strain  as  Overbury, 
but  caricatures  more,  and  has  a  much  less  delicate  fancy. 

Long  after  the  death  of  Samuel  Butler,  author  of '  Hudibras ' 
(1612-1680),  in  1759,  appeared  his  'Genuine  Remains  in  Prose.' 
The  principal  of  them  are  "  Characters  "  in  the  style  of  Overbury 
and  Earle.  Butler  belongs  to  this  generation  through  his  satires 
on  the  Puritans.  His  prose  has  something  of  the  coarse  satiric 
vigour  of  his  poetry;  the  wit  has  a  much  stronger  flavour  than 
either  Overbury' a  or  Earle's. 

Owen  Felltham  (1608-1677?)  put  forth  in  1628  a  second  edition 
of  a  work  called  —  'Resolves'  (that  is,  "Solutions");  'Divine, 
Moral,  and  Political,'  —  consisting  of  essays  on  the  model  of 
Bacon's.  The  work  made  little  noise  at  the  time,  but  being  re- 
printed in  1707,  it  went  through  twelve  editions  in  less  than  two 
years.  The  thoughts  are  commonplace,  the  method  bad,  being  the 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITERS.  3l)7 

disjointed  method  of  Bacon's  essays  without  the  natural  clearness  ; 
and  there  is  a  constant  straining  after  imagery.  Their  popularity 
in  Queen  Anne's  reign  is  accounted  for  by  their  high  moral  tone, 
and  their  occasionally  felicitous  application  of  Baconian  imagery 
to  common  themes,  such  as  moderation  in  grief,  evil-speaking,  in- 
dustry, and  meditation. 

Sir  Thomas  Browne  (1605-1682).— Were  this  book  intended  aa 
a  guide  to  the  intellectual  epicure,  it  should  give  a  large  space  to 
the  works  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  the  curiously  learned,  meditative, 
and  humorous  physician  of  Norwich.1  Born  in  London  the  son  of 
a  rich  merchant,  he  lost  his  father  early,  and  was  defrauded  by  one 
of  his  guardians,  but  was  taken  up  by  his  step-father  and  sent  to 
Winchester  school,  and  thence  to  Oxford.  He  studied  medicine, 
practised  for  some  time  near  Oxford,  travelled  on  the  Continent, 
received  M.D.  at  Leyden  in  1633,  returned  to  England,  practised 
for  a  short  time  near  Halifax,  settled  in  Norwich,  and  there  spent 
the  remainder  of  his  life.  His  first  work,  '  Religio  Medici,' — The 
Keligion  of  a  Physician — published  in  1643,*  made  an  immediate 
sensation,  was  translated  into  Latin,  and  "  very  eagerly  read  in 
England,  France,  Italy,  Belgium,  and  Germany."  It  is  remark- 
able for  its  equanimity  and  tranquil  warmth  of  sentiment ;  he 
avows  himself  an  orthodox  believer  in  the  English  Church,  yet 
he  loves  the  symbols  of  Catholic  worship  ;  he  is  elevated  in  spirit 
at  hearing  "  the  Ave-Mary  bell,"  and  is  moved  to  tears  at  sight  of 
a  solemn  procession;  when  others,  "blind  with  opposition  and 
prejudice,  fall  into  an  excess  of  scorn  and  laughter,"  he  "  cannot 
laugh  at  but  rather  pities  "  the  asceticism  of  pilgrims  and  friars, 
because  there  is  in  it  "something  of  devotion."  He  did  not  like 
to  hear  that  the  Anglican  religion  began  with  Henry  VIIL — he 
desired  for  it  a  longer  antiquity;  and  he  disapproved  of  the 
"popular  scurrilities  and  opprobrious  scoffs  at  the  Bishop  of 
Rome" — "though  he  call  me  heretic,  I  will  not  return  to  him 
the  name  of  antichrist,  man  of  sin,  or  whore  of  Babylon."  For 
all  his  moderation  the  book  was  placed  on  the  '  Index  Expurga- 
torius.' 3  His  other  works  made  less  immediate  noise,  though  they 
contain  equally  fine  passages ;  their  themes  are  less  exciting,  run 
counter  to  no  vested  interests.  The  'Pseudodoxia  Epidemica,' 
or  'Enquiries  into  Vulgar  and  Common  Errors,'  1646,  deals  with 
physical,  not  moral,  errors : — false  beliefs  concerning  the  proper- 
ties of  gems,  of  plants,  of  animals,  of  men  j  mistakes  in  popular 

1  See  p.  95. 

a  A  surreptitious  copy,  published  in  1642,  he  disowned  as  imperfect. 

8  The  fate  of  his  refined  moderation  is  a  warning.  Hating  nobody,  he  was 
hated  and  attacked  by  the  extreme  adherents  of  all  parties ;  denounced  as  an 
atheist,  as  a  Papist,  and  as  a  Presbyterian.  On  the  other  hand,  a  certain  Quaker 
•was  hopeful  of  bringing  him  over  to  the  Society  of  Friends,  because  he  disliked 
otrit'e,  and  with  all  his  love  of  symbolic  acts,  would  not  lift  hi*  hat  to  a  ci  ucilix. 


308  FROM   1640   TO   1670. 

pictures  (the  conventional  dolphin,  pelican,  &c.,  the  conventional 
temptation  of  Eve,  sacrifice  of  Isaac,  &c.) ;  cosmographical  and 
geographical  errors  (concerning  the  seasons,  the  river  Nilus,  the 
blackness  of  Negroes,  &c.) ;  historical  errors,  chiefly  touching 
Scripture  (that  a  man  hath  one  rib  less  than  a  woman,  that  John 
the  Evangelist  should  not  die,  &c.)  'The  Garden  of  Cyrus,  or 
the  Quincuncial  Lozenge,  or  Network  Plantations  of  the  Ancients, 
artificially,  naturally,  mystically  considered,'  1658,  is  a  fanciful 
search  through  nature  for  his  favourite  figure  the  Quincunx :  he 
finds,  says  Coleridge,  "quincunxes  in  heaven  above,  quincunxes 
in  earth  below,  quincunxes  in  the  mind  of  man,  quincunxes  in 
tones,  in  optic  nerves,  in  roots  of  trees,  in  leaves,  in  everything." 
'  Hydriotaphia,'  Urn-burial,  published  along  with  the  '  Garden  of 
Cyrus,'  is  a  discourse  upon  the  ancient  practice  of  cremation, 
occasioned  by  the  discovery  of  certain  urns  in  Norfolk ;  in  the 
concluding  chapter,  the  solemn  impassioned  rhetoric  on  the  short- 
ness of  life,  and  of  posthumous  memory,  is  considered  his  finest 
effort. 

Browne's  character  is  drawn  by  De  Quincey  in  its  points  of 
contrast  with  the  character  of  Jeremy  Taylor.  He  is  "  deep,  tran- 
quil, and  majestic  as  Milton,  silently  premeditating  and  'disclos- 
ing his  golden  couplets,'  as  under  some  genial  instinct  of  incuba- 
tion." The  reference  to  Milton  is  not  so  happy  :  Browne  had  not 
the  passionate  fervour  of  Milton ;  grave,  solemn,  meditative,  with- 
out fire  or  freshness  of  sentiment,  he  would  have  shrunk  from 
Milton's  vituperative  scorn,  and  could  never  have  conceived  the 
tender  and  graceful  fancies  of  Milton's  smaller  poems.  The  pre- 
vailing characteristic  of  his  style  is  tranquil  elaboration.  He 
abounds  in  carefully  constructed  periods,  intermixed  with  shurt 
pointed  sentences  that  have  a  singularly  Johnsonian  sound,  from 
the  fulness  of  the  rhythm.  His  sentence  -  structure  is  more 
"  formed  "  than  in  any  previous  writer,  perhaps  more  so  than  in 
any  writer  anterior  to  Johnson.  His  figures  are  original,  ingeni- 
ous, and  peculiarly  apt ;  he  does  not  err  in  excess  of  similitudea 
Felicitous  and  complete  expression,  comparatively  free  from  tautol- 
ogy, inspires  a  general  feeling  of  vigour ;  and  here  and  there  we 
are  carried  away  by  flights  of  high  and  solemn  elevation.  The 
great  drawback  for  the  modern  reader  is  his  excessive  use  of  words 
coined  from  the  Latin.  Even  Johnson  condemns  him  on  this 
sen  re.  His  Latinised  diction  is  all  the  more  remarkable  because 
he  expressly  condemns  Latin  quotations,  saying  that  "  if  elegancy 
still  proceedeth,  and  English  pens  maintain  that  stream  we  have 
observed  to  flow  from  many,  we  shall  within  few  years  be  fain  to 
learn  Latin  to  understand  English,  and  a  work  will  prove  of  equal 
facility  in  either."  His  offences  have  probably  been  exaggerated, 
extreme  passages  being  tendered  as  fair  examples  :  still  in  every 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  309 

page  thei«  are  at  least  two  words  that  have  not  been  naturalised — 
iatproperations,  amit,  depilous,  manuduction,  and  suchlike. 

Another  recluse,  more  sensitive  and  egotistic,  and  less  full  of 
power  than  the  tranquil  sage  of  Norwich,  was  Dr  Henry  More 
(1614-1687),  Fellow  of  Christ's  College,  Cambridge.  He  was 
obstinately  attached  to  the  cloister  :  he  might  have  had  a  bishop- 
ric;  and  he  refused  even  the  Mastership  of  his  College.  His 
favourite  meditations  were  mystical  speculations  about  the  soul, 
first  evolved  in  his  poem  '  Psychozoia,'  or  "  the  first  part  of  the 
song  of  the  Soul,  containing  a  Christiauo-Platonical  display  of 
life."  He  was  an  admirer  of  Descartes.  He  and  a  few  congenial 
spirits  formed  in  the  reign  of  Charles  IL  a  school  known  as  the 
Plutonising  or  Latitudinarian  Divines. 

Bishop  Wilkins  (1614-1672)  is  known  as  the  author  of  an  "  Essay 
towards  a  real  Character,  and  Philosophical  Language."  He  was 
one  of  our  earliest  physical  speculators :  he  contended  that  the 
moon  was  inhabited  ('  Discovery  of  a  New  World,'  1638)  ;  and  in 
a  work  published  in  1640,  one  of  the  earliest  systematic  defences 
of  the  Copernican  system,  he  maintained  that  the  earth  is  probably 
one  of  the  planets.  During  the  Civil  War  and  the  Protectorate 
he  sided  with  the  Parliament,  and  in  1656  married  a  widowed 
sister  of  Oliver  CromwelL  He  was  appointed  Warden  of  Wadhain, 
Oxford,  and  afterwards  Master  of  Trinity,  Cambridge.  From  this 
preferment  he  was  degraded  at  the  Restoration, -but  he  afterwards 
regained  the  royal  favour,  and  was  elevated  to  the  bench.  He 
is  illustrious  as  one  of  the  fount! ers  of  the  Royal  Society :  the 
scientific  enthusiasts  afterwards  incorporated  with  this  institution 
held  their  first  meetings  in  the  lodgings  of  Dr  Wilkins.  In  the 
Church  he  was  an  eminent  member  of  the  Latitudinarian  school. 
But  his  name  is  most  widely  known  in  connection  with  his  "  dis- 
course concerning  the  possibility  of  a  passage  to  the  moon." 

Sir  Kenelm  Digby  (1603-1665)  deserves  a  word  among  the  half- 
mystic,  half-scientific  men  of  his  time.  He  was  a  strange  com- 
pound of  dashing  soldier,  accomplished  courtier,  successful  lover, 
and  occult  philosopher.  There  are  passages  in  his  treatise — '  Of 
Bodies  and  Man's  Soul ' — hardly  surpassed  in  Sir  Thomas  Browne. 
He  was  one  of  the  original  Council  of  the  Royal  Society. 

Izaak  Walton  (1593-1683),  already  mentioned  as  the  biographer 
of  Hooker,  was  another  quiet  and  peaceable  man  in  an  age  of  ex- 
citement. He  wrote  also  the  lives  of  Donne,  Sir  Henry  Wotton, 
George  Herbert,  and  Bishop  Sanderson :  the  respective  dates  of 
publication  being,  "Donne,"  1640;  "Wotton,"  1651;  "Hooker," 
1662;  "Herbert,"  1670;  "Sanderson,"  1678.  But  the  work 
usually  coupled  with  his  name  is  'The  Complete  Angler'  (1653), 
still  read  by  the  followers  of  "the  gentle  craft"  for  its  in  forma- 
tion, and  interesting  to  the  general  reader  as  disclosing  the  char- 


310  FEOM   1640  TO   1670. 

acter  of  the  writer — quiet,  humorous,  and  enamoured  of  fresh 
pastoral  scenery.  Walton  was  a  retired  London  linen-draper ;  he 
had  married  into  a  clerical  family,  and  spent  the  greater  part  of 
his  retirement  at  the  houses  of  country  clergymen. 

John  Milton  (1608-1674)  wrote  a  good  many  works  in  prose, 
although,  as  he  said,  "  in  this  manner  of  writing,  knowing  myself 
inferior  to  myself,  led  by  the  genial  power  of  nature  to  another 
task,  I  have  the  use,  as  I  may  account  it,  but  of  my  left  hand." 
His  first  appearance  was  on  the  Puritan  side,  in  a  treatise  entitled 
4  Of  Reformation,'  1641.  In  the  same  year  he  put  forth  a  treatise 
S0f  Prelatical  Episcopacy,'  as  his  contribution  in  the  warfare 
raised  by  Joseph  Hall's  '  Humble  Remonstrance '  in  favour  of 
Episcopacy.  This  work  he  had  to  back  up  with  two  tracts : 
"Animadversions  on  a  '  Defence '  of  the  Remonstrance;"  and  "  An 
Apology  for  Smectymnuus,"  in  reply  to  a  criticism  of  the  Animad- 
versions. In  1642  he  came  forward  with  a  larger  work — 'The 
Reason  of  Church  Government  urged  against  Prelacy.'  This 
was  for  the  time  his  last  word  on  the  Church  government  contro- 
versy. In  1644  he  wrote  his  '  Areopagitica,  a  Speech  for  the 
Liberty  of  Unlicensed  Printing,'  the  first  formal  plea  for  the  free- 
dom of  the  press.  In  1645  ^e  wr°te  his  famous  works  advocating 
greater  freedom  of  Divorce — '  Doctrine  and  Discipline  of  Divorce,' 
'  Judgment  of  Martin  Bucer  concerning  Divorce,'  '  Tetrachordon,' 
and  '  Colasterion.'  After  the  exertion  of  writing  these  works — 

"  I  imagined,"  he  says,  "  that  I  was  about  to  enjoy  an  interval  of  unin- 
terrupted ease,  and  turned  my  thoughts  to  a  continued  history  of  my  country, 
from  the  earliest  times  to  the  present  period.  I  had  already  finished  four 
books  ;  when  after  the  subversion  of  the  monarchy,  and  the  establishment 
of  a  republic,  I  was  surprised  by  an  invitation  from  the  Council  of  State, 
who  desired  my  services  in  the  office  for  foreign  affairs.  A  book  appeared 
soon  after,  which  was  ascribed  to  the  King,  and  contained  the  most  invidious 
charges  against  the  Parliament.  I  was  ordered  to  answer  it,  and  opposed 
the  '  Eikouoclastes  '  to  the  *  Eikon."  " 

This  was  in  the  end  of  1649.  Before  this,  in  the  beginning  of 
the  year,  immediately  after  the  King's  execution,  he  published  his 
'  Tenure  of  Kings  and  Magistrates.'  Thereafter  he  engaged  in  a 
Latin  controversy  with  Salmasius,  a  rhetorical  Leyden  Professor, 
said  to  have  been  hired  to  defend  the  memory  of  the  King,  and 
asperse  his  executioners ;  the  titles  of  Milton's  works  were,  '  A 
Defence  of  the  People  of  England '  (1651),  and  '  A  Second  Defence ' 
(1654).  An  earnest  champion  up  to  the  last  moments  of  the  dis- 
solving Commonwealth,  he  wrote  in  1659 — '  A  Treatise  of  Civil 
Power  in  Ecclesiastical  Causes,'  '  Considerations  towards  the  like 
liest  Means  to  remove  Hirelings  out  of  the  Church,'  and  '  A  Letter 
to  a  Friend  concerning  the  Ruptures  of  the  Commonwealth.'  Next 
year  he  addressed  a  letter  to  Monk — '  The  present  means  and  brief 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  311 

declaration  of  a  free  Commonwealth,  easy  to  be  put  in  practice, 
and  without  delay.'  When  the  fatal  moment  came  nearer,  he 
issued  a  last  appeal — '  The  ready  and  easy  way  to  establish  a  free 
Commonwealth,  and  the  excellence  thereof  compared  with  the 
inconvenience  and  dangers  of  readmitting  kingship  in  this  nation. 
The  author  J.  M.'  Immediately  after  the  Restoration  he  was  busy 
with  his  '  Paradise  Lost.'  His  remaining  works  in  prose  are — a 
'  History  of  Britain,  down  to  the  Norman  Conquest'  (1670);  a 
treatise — '  Of  True  Religion,  Heresy,  Schism,  Toleration,  and  what 
best  Means  may  be  used  against  the  growth  of  Popery ; '  and  a 
'  Brief  History  of  Muscovia,  and  of  other  less  known  Countries 
lying  eastward  of  Russia,  as  far  as  Cathay.'  He  wrote  also  in 
Latin  a  '  Treatise  on  Logic ; '  published  a  collection  of  Latin 
Familiar  Letters ;  spent  several  years  on  an  extensive  Latin  Dic- 
tionary ;  and  left  at  his  death  a  system  of  Christian  Doctrine,  the 
discovery  of  which,  in  1823,  and  its  publication  by  royal  order, 
gave  an  opportunity  for  Macaulay's  celebrated  Essay. 

Concerning  Milton's  style  the  most  diverse  opinions  have  been 
pronounced.  Everything  depends  upon  the  point  of  view.  Rich 
and  powerful  it  is  undeniably,  coming  from  such  a  master  of 
words,  and  yields  in  the  highest  degree  the  pleasure  of  luxurious 
expression.  But  the  student  need  hardly  be  warned  that  Milton's 
prose  is  to  be  enjoyed  without  being  imitated :  for  modern  pur- 
poses the  language  and  idiom  are  too  stiffly  Latinised,  and  the 
imagery  too  fantastic.  Further,  for  a  work  of  controversy  the 
style  is  too  ornate,  too  unmethodical,  and  too  coarsely  vituperative 
to  have  much  convincing  or  converting  power.  In  Milton  still 
more  than  in  Taylor  the  application  is  lost  in  the  gorgeous  splen- 
dour of  words  and  imagery,  and  all  but  decided  adherents  are 
repelled  by  the  unmeasured  discharge  of  abuse  and  ridicule. 

The  author  of  '  Eikon  Basilike ;  or  the  Portraiture  of  his  Most 
Sacred  Majesty  in  his  Solitude  and  Sufferings,'  was  Bishop 
Gauden  (1605-1662).1  Purporting  to  be  written  by  Charles  him- 
self, and  published  a  few  days  after  his  execution,  this  work  had  a 
prodigious  effect,  fifty  editions  being  sold  within  the  year.  There 
is  nothing  in  the  style  deserving  notice ;  it  professes  to  be  a  simple 
record  of  the  King's  meditations. 

Thomas  Hobbes  (1588-1679),  "  the  philosopher  of  Malmesbury," 
is  notorious  for  his  views  of  human  nature,  and  of  the  relations 
between  the  governing  power  and  the  subject  His  long  life  covers 
three  generations.  The  works  that  have  immortalised  his  name 
were  written  between  1640  and  1660:  the  dates  of  publication 
being — 'De  Give,'  privately  circulated  in  1642,  published  with 
notes  in  1647,  an^  translated  into  English  in  1650;  'Treatise  on 

1  The  authorship  of  the  '  Eikon  Basilike '  was  the  great  literary  puzzle  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  as  '  Junius '  was  of  the  eighteenth. 


312  FROM    1640  TO   1670. 

Human  Nature,'  1650;  'De  Corpore  Politico,'  a  concise  summary 
in  English  of  his  main  political  views,  1650 ;  '  Leviathan,  or  the 
Matter,  Power,  and  Form  of  a  Commonwealth,  Ecclesiastical  and 
Civil,'  1651  ;  '  De  Corpore,'  the  fundamental  work  of  his  philo- 
sophical system,  1655,  done  into  English  1656. 

Malmesbury  was  the  place  of  his  birth.  It  is  said  that  hia 
mother,  overpowered  by  the  national  excitement  at  the  coming  of 
the  Armada,  brought  him  forth  prematurely.  He  mentions  this 
himself  to  account  for  a  certain  constitutional  timidity  that  never 
left  him.  He  was  a  precocious  child.  He  graduated  at  Oxford  in 
1608;  and  being  almost  immediately  appointed  half  tutor,  half 
companion  to  the  son  of  the  first  Earl  of  Devonshire,  he  spent  the 
next  twenty  years  of  his  life  in  ease,  travelling  on  the  Continent, 
and  at  home  forming  the  acquaintance  of  the  most  eminent  men  of 
the  time,  Bacon,  Lord  Herbert,  Ben  Jonsori,  and  others.  His  pupil 
and  patron  died  in  1628,  and  in  that  year  he  made  his  first  publi- 
cation, a  translation  of  Thucydides,  undertaken  to  show  the  evils 
of  popular  rule.  From  1631  to  1637  he  was  tutor  to  the  third 
Earl  of  Devonshire,  a  boy ;  and  travelling  in  that  capacity,  made 
the  acquaintance  of  Galileo,  Mersenne,  and  other  eminent  men, 
in  whose  company  he  had  his  thoughts  turned  towards  physical 
science.  For  eleven  years,  from  1640  to  1651,  he  sought  shelter 
in  Paris  from  the  apprehended  hostility  of  the  Long  Parliament, 
having  by  this  time  become  known  as  a  political  thinker,  and  was 
active,  as  we  have  said,  in  the  composition  of  his  leading  works. 
In  1651,  fearing  persecution  at  Paris  in  consequence  of  his  obnox- 
ious opinions,  he  ventured  back  to  England,  and  lived  unmolested 
with  the  Devonshire  family  through  the  remainder  of  the  Com- 
monwealth, and  the  first  nineteen  years  of  the  restored  monarchy. 
Though  free  from  material  discomfort,  his  old  age  was  not  a  little 
troubled.  He  was  assailed  by  swarms  of  hostile  critics  for  his 
obnoxious  views  of  human  nature  and  politics,  and  his  works  were 
formally  censured  by  Parliament  in  1666.  To  add  to  this  vexation, 
he  ha- 1  provoked  a  quarrel  with  mathematicians,  Dr  Wallis  and 
others,  maintaining  that  he  had  discovered  the  quadrature  of  the 
circle,  and  defying  the  whole  race  of  geometers  and  natural  philo- 
sophers with  acrimonious  contempt.  In  extreme  old  age  he  "  wrote 
in  Latin  metre  a  history  of  the  Romish  Church  and  an  autobiogra- 
phy ;  and  in  his  eighty-sixth  year,  amid  other  occupations,  trans- 
lated the  '  Odyssey '  and  '  Iliad '  into  vigorous,  if  not  elegant, 
English  verse."  After  his  death  was  published  his  last  work, 
entitled  '  Behemoth ;  or  a  History  of  the  Civil  Wars  from  1640 
to  1660.' 

The  merits  ascribed  to  his  style  are  brevity,  simplicity,  and  pre- 
cision. These  merits  are  sometimes  extravagantly  overrated.  Sir 
James  Mackintosh  says : — 


MISCELLANEOUS    V7E1TEKS.  313 

"A  permanent  foundation  of  his  fame  remains  in  his  admirable  style, 
which  seems  to  be  the  very  perfection  of  didactic  language.  Short,  clear, 
precise,  pithy,  his  language  never  has  more  than  one  meaning,  which  it 
never  requires  a  second  thought  to  take.  By  the  help  of  his  exact  method, 
it  takes  so  firm  a  hold  on  the  mind  that  it  will  not  allow  attention  to 
slacken." 

This  is  mere  reckless  hyperbole.  The  words  put  in  italics  describe 
an  ideal  that  every  expositor  should  try  to  attain,  but  which  no 
expositor  can  hope  to  reach.  Undoubtedly  Hobbes  took  great 
pains  to  be  simple  and  precise.  He  makes  an  effort  to  express 
himself  in  familiar  words,  explains  his  general  positions  by  exam- 
ples, and  his  order  of  exposition  is  such  as  can  be  easily  followed. 
Having  a  deep  sense  of  the  evils  of  ambiguous  language,  he  is  care- 
ful to  define  his  terms.  Further,  he  has  great  powers  of  terse  and 
vigorous  statement,  his  figures  are  studied  and  apt,  and  his  didactic 
strain  is  enlivened  by  ingenious  and  occasionally  sarcastic  point. 
Yet  he  is  far  from  being  a  perfect  expositor,  as  he  is  by  no  means 
always  a  consistent  thinker.  When  he  enters  upon  details,  he  is 
often  perplexed,  does  not  keep  his  main  subject  prominent,  and 
introduces  statements  out  of  their  proper  order.  There  are  pas- 
sages in  his  works  that  Sir  James  could  not  have  taken  up  at  finst 
sight  without  a  superhuman  quickness  of  apprehension.  The  truth 
is,  that  Hobbes  owes  his  reputation  for  simplicity  and  clearness  in 
a  very  large  measure  to  the  simplicity  of  his  leading  ideas.  The 
plain  language  and  exact  method  would  not  have  made  the  style 
so  famous  had  not  the  matter  been  simple  to  the  degree  of  slurring 
over  difficulties.  Both  upon  mind  and  upon  politics  he  superin- 
duces simple  and  plausible  theories,  assembles  the  facts  that  sup- 
port them,  and  says  nothing  about  the  facts  that  they  do  not  ex- 
plain. That  there  is  an  external  world  and  a  mental  experience ; 
that  thought  consists  merely  in  a  continuance  of  movements  com- 
municated to  the  organs  of  sense  by  the  external  world  ;  that  man's 
motives  are  originally  selfish ;  that  the  aboriginal  men  lived  in  war 
and  anarchy ;  that  government  arose  when  they  came  to  an  under- 
standing, and  entered  into  a  contract  to  observe  certain  rules ;  that 
these  rules  constitute  right,  and  must  at  all  risks  be  obeyed, — such 
doctrines  are  simple,  immediately  and  clearly  intelligible,  but  their 
simplicity  is  gained  by  glossing  over  the  complicacy  of  the  actual 
problems.  Not  that  Hobbes  had  any  conscious  desire  to  skip  over 
difficulties.  The  inaccurate  simplicity  of  his  doctrines  is  to  be 
attributed  to  his  strong  feeling  of  the  vagueness  of  previous  specu- 
lations, his  endeavour  to  attain  greater  certainty  by  applying  the 
method  of  mathematics,  and  his  failure  to  verify  his  results  by  an 
appeal  to  actual  life. 

Along  with  Hobbes  may  be  mentioned,  as  a  political  speculator, 
James  Harrington  (1611-1677),  author  of  ,'Oceana'  (published 


314  FROM   1640  TO   1670. 

1656),  an  ideal  republic.     In  his  review  of  the  literatuie  of  the 
period,  Hume  has  the  following: — 

"  Harrington's  'Oceana'  was  well  adapted  to  that  age,  when  the  plans  of 
imaginary  republics  were  the  daily  subjects  of  debate  and  conversation,  and 
even  in  our  time  it  is  justly  admired  as  a  work  of  genius  and  invention. 
The  style  of  this  author  wants  ease  and  fluency,  but  the  good  matter  which 
liis  work  contains  makes  compensation." 

Another  republican,  a  more  fiery  man  of  action  than  Harrington, 
was  Algernon  Sidney  (1622-1683),  author  of  a  '  Discourse  on  Gov- 
ernment.' Sidney  inherited  headstrong  blood  from  both  parents. 
His  father  was  Robert,  Earl  of  Leicester,  and  his  mother  a  daughter 
of  Percy,  Earl  of  Northumberland.  He  was  a  most  determined  foe 
to  monarchy ;  engaged  vehemently  on  the  side  of  the  Parliament, 
refused  to  take  office  under  the  usurpation  of  Cromwell,  and  fled 
to  the  Continent  at  the  Restoration,  refusing  the  mediation  of  his 
friends  with  the  restored  monarch.  Obtaining  permission  to  re- 
turn in  1677,  he  threw  himself  into  the  opposition  to  the  Govern- 
ment, and  in  his  furious  zeal  for  the  accomplishment  of  his  aims, 
engaged,  if  the  papers  of  the  French  Ambassador  are  to  be  trusted, 
in  unscrupulous  intrigues  with  France.  In  1 683  he  was  condemned. 
on  very  partial  evidence,  upon  the  charge  of  conspiring  to  assassi- 
nate the  King,  and  was  executed  on  Tower-hill.  He  is  regarded 
as  a  martyr  to  republican  principles.  His  '  Discourse '  was  first 
published  in  1698. 

Marchinont  Needham  (1620-1678)  is  the  chief  representative  ot 
journalism  in  this  generation.  Public  events  favoured  the  growth 
of  newspapers :  the  Thirty  Years'  War  on  the  Continent  was  not 
concluded  when  topics  of  more  powerful  interest  arose  at  home 
with  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War.  Many  sheets,  with  every 
variety  of  piquant  title,  started  into  existence  to  meet  the  public 
thirst  for  intelligence.  On  the  ist  of  January  1642  the  '  Mercurius 
Aulicus'  was  issued  from  Oxford,  avowedly  as  the  organ  of  the 
King's  party.  It  was  edited  by  one  Birkenhead,  then  a  Fellow  of 
All-Souls,  and  for  a  short  time  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy. 
He  was  appointed  licenser  of  the  press  after  the  Restoration.  In 
1643,  Needham,  another  Oxonian,  appeared  with  an  opposition 
"  Mercury,"  entitled  '  Mercurius  Britannicus.'  His  paper  was  ex- 
ceedingly popular;  but  the  Puritans  were  stern  censors  of  the 
press,  and  the  gay  and  restless  Needham,  after  serving  them  for 
four  years,  went  over  to  the  King,  and  turned  his  wit  against  his 
former  masters.  He  stood  by  the  King  to  the  last,  and  was  im- 
prisoned and  condemned  to  death  ;  but  Toeing  offered  his  life  by  the 
Independents  upon  condition  of  giving  them  his  services  against 
the  Presbyterians,  he  accepted  the  offer,  and  remained  "  Parlia- 
mentary intelligencer"  until  the  Restoration.  Both  Birkenhead 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITERS.  315 

and  Needham  are  abused  for  raillery,  buffoonery,  and  want  of 
principle ;  but  facts  do  not  show  them  to  have  differed  much  from 
their  contemporaries,  except  in  a  clever  faculty  of  gaining  the 
popular  ear.1  Needham's  changes  of  party  are  explicable  without 
the  supposition  that  he  was  worse  than  other  men.  He  seems  to 
have  been  a  gay,  versatile  creature,  and  is  mentioned  by  Anthony 
4  Wood  as  possessing  considerable  humour  and  convivial  qualities 

1  Cornlull  Magazine,  July  1868. 


CHAPTER    V. 


FEOM    1670   TO    I7<XX 


BIB    WILLIAM     TEMPLE, 

1628 — 1699. 

DIPLOMATIST,  statesman,  and  miscellaneous  writer,  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  men  under  the  reign  of  Charles  IL  Swift,  not 
given  to  over-praising,  said:  "it  is  generally  believed  that  this 
author  has  advanced  our  English  tongue  to  as  great  a  perfection 
as  it  can  well  bear."  And  Johnson  is  reported  to  have  laid  down 
in  conversation  that  "  Sir  William  Temple  was  the  first  writer 
•who  gave  cadence  to  English  prose.  Before  this  time  they  were 
careless  of  arrangement,  and  did  not  mind  whether  a  sentence 
ended  with  an  important  word  or  an  insignificant  word,  or  with 
what  part  of  speech  it  was  concluded."  Spoken  in  the  hurry  of 
conversation,  this  dictum  asserts  several  merits.  Usually  the  first 
part  is  quoted  and  the  second  passed  over,  although  the  second  is 
the  higher  compliment.  Better  general  method,  and  greater  atten- 
tion to  details  of  expression,  are  more  valuable  improvements  than 
superior  regularity  of  cadence. 

To  the  family  of  Temple  belong  some  of  the  most  eminent 
names  in  our  political  history.  The  late  Lord  Palmerston  was 
descended  from  a  brother  of  Sir  William's.  In  last  century 
three  Privy  Councillors — Sir  Richard  Temple,  Baron  Cobham ; 
Earl  Temple ;  and  Lord  Grenville — came  from  another  branch  of 
the  same  family.  "  There  were  times,"  says  Macaulay,  "  when 
the  cousinhood,  as  it  was  once  nicknamed,  would  of  itself  have 
furnished  almost  all  the  materials  necessary  for  the  construction 
of  an  efficient  Cabinet."  The  lineal  descendants  of  Sir  William 


SIK   WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  317 

himself  ended  with  the  third  generation.  The  family  has  been 
continued  chiefly  through  the  female  line. 

Our  author's  ancestors  did  not  rise  to  the  highest  offices  of 
state,  yet  they  were  men  of  considerable  mark  It  is  interesting 
to  know  that  his  grandfather  was  the  chosen  companion  of  Sir 
Philip  Sidney  during  the  Flemish  war,  and  was  present  at  that 
hero's  untimely  death.  His  father  was  made  Master  of  the  Rolls 
of  Ireland  by  Charles  L,  and  retained  the  office,  with  a  short 
interval,  throughout  the  Commonwealth,  dying  in  1677,  of  the 
same  age  as  the  century. 

Sir  William  was  born  in  London.  His  tutor  at  Cambridge, 
where  he  resided  two  years,  was  the  learned  Cudworth.  From 
1648  to  1654  he  travelled  on  the  Continent,  making  himself 
master  of  French  and  Spanish.  His  first  public  employment  was 
as  a  member  of  the  Irish  Convention  in  1660:  there  he  gained 
distinction  by  taking  the  lead  against  an  exorbitant  tax  proposed 
by  the  new  and  popular  Government.  In  1665  began  his  career 
as  a  diplomatist  In  that  year  he  displayed  such  address  as  envoy 
to  the  Bishop  of  Munster  that  he  was  appointed  Resident  at  the 
viceregal  Spanish  Court  of  Brussels.  In  1668  he  accomplished 
with  unparalleled  speed  the  famous  negotiation  usually  coupled 
with  his  name,  the  Triple  Alliance  between  England,  Holland, 
and  Sweden.  Immediately  after  this  he  was  made  Ambassador 
at  the  Hague,  and  completed  the  Treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle.  In 
1670,  in  consequence  of  the  King's  dishonest  intrigues  with  France, 
he  was  recalled,  and  spent  three  years  in  retirement  at  Sheen.  In 
1673  he  concluded  the  peace  that  followed  upon  Charles's  second 
war  with  Holland ;  and,  declining  an  offer  of  the  embassy  to  Spain, 
and  also  the  Secretaryship  of  State,  was  again,  in  June  1674,  ap- 
pointed Ambassador  at  the  Hague.  He  had  the  credit  of  bringing 
about  during  that  embassy  the  marriage  between  William  of  Orange 
and  the  Princess  Mary.  In  1678  he  represented  England  in  an 
endeavour  to  settle  the  complicated  relations  of  Continental  powers; 
but  his  efforts  to  uphold  the  dignity  of  our  Government  as  an  ar- 
bitrating power  were  baffled  by  the  distractingly  crooked  policy  of 
the  King  and  his  Ministers.  He  maintained  his  integrity  by  refus- 
ing to  sign  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen.  In  1679  he  was  summoned 
from  Holland  to  take  office  as  Secretary  of  State,  but  ingeniously 
contrived  to  evade  the  hazardous  dignity.  His  only  other  public 
service  was  the  plan  of  a  Privy  Council  of  thirty  to  renew  the 
confidence  of  the  nation  in  King  Charles.  When  this  scheme 
worked  ill  from  the  multiplicity  of  intrigue  at  the  Court,  he  retired 
altogether  from  public  business.  He  was  frequently  consulted  dur- 
ing his  retirement  by  Charles  II.,  James  II.,  and  William ;  but 
nothing  could  induce  him  to  resume  office.  No  man,  he  sa/d, 
should  be  in  public  business  after  fifty ;  and  ten  years  before  this 


318  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

he  had  declared  that  he  knew  enough  of  Courts  to  see  "  that  they 
were  not  made  for  one  another."  Having  purchased  Moor  Park, 
near  Farnham  iu  Surrey,  he  went  there  in  1686,  and  amused  him- 
self with  literature,  architecture,  Dutch  gardening,  and  other  em- 
ployments of  retired  leisure.  At  the  Revolution  he  was  much 
pressed  to  take  office,  but  steadfastly  refused,  and  lived  in  retire- 
ment at  Moor  Park  till  his  death  in  1699. 

The  various  works  he  has  left  us  were  composed  in  his  periods 
of  retirement  During  his  temporary  seclusion,  between  1670 
and  1673,  he  wrote  his  '  Observations  on  the  United  Provinces,' 
and  some  miscellaneous  pieces.  In  his  final  retirement  he  selected 
and  prepared  for  the  press  his  public  correspondence  during  the 
years  of  his  active  life.  He  also  wrote  '  Memoirs  of  the  Treaty  of 
Nimeguen,'  with  an  account  of  the  difficulties  that  this  Treaty  was 
designed  to  solve.  To  complete  his  record  of  what  passed  during 
his  public  employment,  he  wrote  other  Memoirs,  "  from  the  peace 
concluded  1679,  to  the  time  of  the  author's  retirement  from  public 
business."  He  wrote  also  various  Miscellanies — "  Upon  the  Gar- 
dens of  Epicurus;"  "Of  Heroic  Virtue;"  "Of  Poetry;"  "On 
the  Cure  of  the  Gout  by  Moxa,"  «kc. 

"  Sir  William  Temple's  person,"  says  the  nameless  writer  of  "  a 
short  character"  prefixed  to  his  works,  "is  best  known  by  his 
pictures  and  prints.  He  was  rather  tall  than  low ;  his  shape, 
when  young,  very  exact ;  his  hair  a  dark  brown,  and  curled 
naturally,  and,  whilst  that  was  esteemed  a  beauty,  nobody  had 
it  in  greater  perfection ;  his  eyes  grey,  but  lively ;  and  his  body 
lean,  but  extreme  active,  so  that  none  acquitted  themselves  better 
at  all  sorts  of  exercise." 

What  principally  strikes  us  in  Temple's  intellect  is  its  singular 
measure,  solidity,  sagacity.  In  negotiating  he  timed  his  move- 
ments with  admirable  skill ;  he  succeeded  in  whatever  he  under- 
took ;  he  was  the  author  of  the  most  famous  alliance  in  that 
generation,  and  nobody  has  detected  a  flaw  in  his  plans,  or  proved 
that  in  his  diplomacy  he  should  have  acted  otherwise  than  he  did. 
The  same  sagacity  appears  in  his  political  speculations ;  he  keeps 
fllose  to  the  facts,  and  does  not  begin  to  speculate  till  he  has 
mastered  them.  Such  he  was  as  a  man  of  practice  and  a  thinker, 
attempting  comparatively  little,  and  doing  what  he  attempted  with 
thoroughness.  When  we  view  him  on  the  aesthetic  side,  we  see 
the  same  characteristic  appearing  in  the  shape  of  refined  taste. 
He  did  not  attempt  works  of  the  imagination,  but  he  studied  the 
beauties  of  order  and  finished  rhythm,  and  even  in  his  most 
didactic  compositions  the  language  and  the  similitudes  have  a 
refined  elevation. 

He  seems  to  have  been  a  man  of  deep  tenderness  and  strong 


SIR   WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  319 

personal  feelings,  a  great  favourite  with  children,  a  passionate 
lover,  a  fond  husband,  a  constant  friend.  As  his  likes  were  strong, 
so  were  his  dislikes  ;  he  had  such  an  aversion  for  some  men  as  to 
be  impatient  of  their  conversation. 

But  however  strong  his  feelings  might  be,  he  kept  the  expres- 
sion of  them  under  control.  He  was  not  extravagant  in  his 
professions  of  attachment,  but  sprightly  and  humorous;  and  he 
had,  as  even  Macaulay  admits,  a  good  command  of  his  naturally 
irritable  temper.  So  with  his  love  of  power;  he  did  not  rush 
actively  into  the  struggle  of  ambition,  and  he  would  not  seem  to 
have  occupied  his  imagination  with  ambitious  dreams.  He  was 
equally  moderate  in  his  admiration  of  power:  he  could  admire; 
he  was  not  an  envious  disappointed  man ;  but  he  admired  with  a 
just  appreciation  of  the  actors  and  the  circumstances.  Unprinci- 
pled, egotistic  ambition  he  could  not  admire;  his  sympathies  and 
general  human  kindliness  were  too  predominant  for  that.  In  his 
political  treatises,  his  personality  comes  little  to  the  surface ;  he  is 
grave  and  dignified  as  becomes  his  subject,  and  criticises  in  the 
impersonal  spirit  of  a  statesman  warmly  interested  in  humanity, 
but  elevated  above  party  or  national  feeling  by  the  comprehen- 
siveness of  his  views.  In  the  Preface  to  the  '  Observations  on  the 
United  Provinces,'  he  states  how  far  he  looks  upon  History  as  a 
field  of  scenic  interest.1  His  published  letters  abound  in  graceful 
compliments  and  strokes  of  wit.  But  in  nearly  all  his  formal 
essays  he  has  an  eye  to  instruction  rather  than  pleasure :  "  I  can 
truly  say,  that,  of  all  the  paper  I  have  blotted,  which  has  been  a 
great  deal  in  my  time,  I  have  never  written  anything  for  the 
public  without  the  intention  of  some  public  good." 

In  the  discharge  of  public  business  he  showed  the  measure  that 
seems  to  us  his  most  striking  characteristic.  That  he  could  act 
with  vigour  and  decision  upon  an  emergency  was  proved  in  more 
than  one  trying  situation.  He  ascribed  the  failure  of  his  constitu- 
tion in  middle  life  partly  to  "unnecessary  diligences  in  his  em- 
ployments abroad ; "  and  doubtless  one-half  of  his  success  as  a 
diplomatist  was  due  to  his  promptitude  in  seizing  the  favourable 
moment.  But  he  kept  his  energies  strictly  in  hand ;  he  lived 
temperately,  he  was  distinguished  for  his  frankness  and  truthful- 
ness, and  showed  no  propensity  to  grasp  momentary  advantages 
by  unscrupulous  craft.  He  refrained  immovably  from  affairs  that 
he  knew  to  be  beyond  his  power.  When  the  Court  was  in  confu- 
sion from  the  intrigues  of  unscrupulous  rivals  and  the  unpatriotic 
policy  of  the  King,  nothing  could  induce  him  to  accept  office.  He 
joined  neither  the  unprincipled  struggle  for  power,  nor  the  hope- 
less endeavours  under  the  name  of  patriotism.  He  boldly  lectured 
the  King  on  the  duties  of  his  position,  and  steadily  wound  himself 

1  See  p.  322. 


320  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

out  of  the  imbroglio.  He  could  act  with  vigour,  but  action  was 
not  a  necessity  of  his  nature.  After  his  fixed  resolution  "  never 
more  to  meddle  with  any  public  employment,"  he  busied  himself 
with  his  garden  and  his  books,  "  taking  no  more  notice  of  what 
passed  upon  the  public  scene  than  an  old  man  uses  to  do  of  what 
is  acted  on  a  theatre,  where  he  gets  as  easy  a  seat  as  he  can,  enter- 
tains himself  with  what  passes  on  the  stage,  not  caring  who  the 
actors  are,  nor  what  the  plot,  nor  whether  he  goes  out  before  the 
play  be  done." 

In  practical  politics  the  most  important  of  Temple's  views  are 
those  regarding  England's  best  Continental  policy  in  the  then 
existing  situation.  The  Triple  Alliance,  between  England,  Hol- 
land, and  Sweden,  is  a  clear  and  easily  remembered  index  As 
Sidney  and  Raleigh  had  to  urge  the  growing  power  of  Spain  upon 
the  Government  of  Elizabeth,  so  Temple  had  to  urge  the  growing 
power  of  France  upon  the  Government  of  Charles.  He  advocated 
alliance  with  Holland  in  opposition  both  to  commercial  jealousy 
and  to  the  French  proclivities  of  the  Court  As  a  speculator  upon 
the  '  Original  and  Nature  of  Government,'  he  writes  with  charac- 
teristic sagacity.  Concerning  the  origin  of  government,  his  lead- 
ing views  coincide  with  what  is  now  generally  accepted.  He  dis- 
misses the  theory  of  an  original  contract,  and  treats  political  com- 
munities as  an  expansion  of  the  family  system.  The  existence  of 
aristocracies  he  ascribes  in  most  cases  to  an  incoming  of  conquerors. 
As  regards  the  best  form  of  government,  he  holds  that  there  are 
but  two  leading  forms,  the  rule  of  one  and  the  rule  of  several ;  that 
experience  gives  little  light  as  to  the  best  system  in  detail  He 
lays  down  the  seeming  truism  that  "  those  are  generally  the  best 
governments  where  the  best  men  govern."  But  farther,  he  consid- 
ers that  all  government  rests  ultimately  on  the  will  of  the  people, 
however  propitiated,  and  that  the  most  stable  government  is  the 
pyramidal,  the  government  that  rests  on  the  widest  basis  of  popu- 
lar confidence.  He  is  not  misled  into  overrating  the  importance 
of  Greek  and  Roman  history  to  the  political  student ;  he  regards 
the  classical  governments  as  short-lived  political  failures,  and  con- 
siders the  more  stable  institutions  of  China,  of  the  Ottomans,  of 
the  Goths,  and  of  Peru,  as  at  least  equally  deserving  of  attention. 

His  Essay  on  Ancient  and  Modern  Learning  maintains  that  the 
ancient  literature  is  superior  to  the  modern.  We  must  remember 
that  it  was  written  before  1688.  He  was  not  the  originator  of  the 
comparison ;  it  was  a  favourite  theme  among  members  of  the 
French  Academy  and  of  the  English  Royal  Society.  Our  author 
dwells  chiefly  on  general  considerations.  He  rebuts  the  argument 
that  the  moderns  must  be  better  than  the  ancients  because  intel- 
lects are  very  much  the  same  in  all  ages  and  countries,  and  because 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE.  321 

the  moderns  have  always  the  advantage  of  the  experience  of  their 
predecessors.  He  argues  that  the  Greeks  had  before  them  the 
wisdom  of  the  Egyptians  and  the  Hindus ;  that  "  many  circum- 
stances concur  to  one  production  that  do  not  to  any  other,  in  one 
or  many  ages  ;"  and  that  in  recent  times  learning  had  been  discour- 
aged by  ecclesiastical  disputes,  civil  dissensions,  want  of  royal 
patronage,  and  general  contempt  of  scholarship,  owing  to  the  ex- 
cessive pedantry  of  some  scholars.  He  considers  Sidney,  Bacon, 
and  Selden  the  three  greatest  "  wits"  among  the  English  moderns: 
he  does  not  mention  Shakspeara 

ELEMENTS  OP  8TYLR 

Vocabulary. — In  Temple  we  meet  with  very  few  words  that  are 
not  to  be  found  in  good  modern  prose.  But  some  of  the  phrases 
and  combinations  are  rather  old-fashioned, — such  as,  "  I  am  not  in 
pain  "  for  /  am  under  no  alarm;  "  wits  possessed  of  the  vogue ; " 
" it  is  all  a  case "  for  it  is  all  one;  "the  bottom  and  reach  of  the 
design,"  where  a  modern  writer  would  probably  say — "  the  founda- 
tion and  object  of  the  plot  (or  of  the  conspiracy) ; "  "  these  spirits 
were  fed  and  heightened  "  for  "  this  state  of  feeling  was  inflamed 
(or  encouraged)." — Any  reader  comparing  Temple's  diction  with 
ordinary  modern  diction  cannot  fail  to  notice  in  how  many  cases 
Saxon  expressions  have  been  superseded  by  Latin. 

His  style  is  sometimes  decried  as  being  tainted  with  Gallicisms. 
The  accusation  should  be  limited.  In  his  '  Memoirs '  he  uses  a 
good  many  French  terms  and  turns — such  as,  "  with  all  the  secret 
imaginable  "  (for  secrecy),  "  resentment  of  kindness  shown  me  "  (for 
gratitude),  "  this  testimony  is  justly  due  to  all  that  practised  him  " 
(for  all  that  had  much  intercourse  with  him).  As  Swift  tells  us,  he 
used  these  expressions  unconsciously,  being  led  into  them  natu- 
rally from  carrying  on  diplomacy  in  French.  But  when  the  fault 
was  pointed  out  to  him,  he  took  pains  to  correct  it,  and,  except  in 
his  '  Memoirs,'  there  are  few  traces  either  of  French  terms  or  of 
French  idiom. 

Sentences. — Comparing  Temple's  composition  with  any  publica- 
tion of  anterior  date,  we  remark  that  the  placing  of  words  is  better 
attended  to  ;  the  cadence  being  more  regularly  filled  out,  and  the 
balance  of  the  clauses  more  neatly  finished.  In  especial,  we  remark 
a  peculiar  finish  of  pointed  balance — greater  pains  to  bring  two 
opposed  words  or  phrases  into  corresponding  places  in  the  syntax 
of  two  successive  clauses,  and  so  more  pointedly  direct  attention  to 
the  antithesis. 

We  must  not  suppose  from  Johnson's  panegyric  that  Temple 
was  the  inventor  of  rhythmical  balance  and  point.  It  has  been 
seen  that  these  arts  of  style  were  practised  under  Elizabeth ;  every 

x 


322  FROM  1670  TO   1700. 

age,  indeed,  can  produce  at  least  one  representative  of  the  pointed 
style.  Temple's  merit  lies  in  improving  and  perfecting.  In  his 
composition  the  recurrence  of  clauses  formed  after  the  same  model 
is  more  measured  and  regular.  After  reading  a  part  of  any  of  his 
highly  finished  passages,  our  ear  comes  to  expect  something  more 
or  less  pointed  in  every  sentence,  and  we  are  seldom  disappointed. 
Were  the  subject-matter  trifling,  this  would  soon  become  tiresome  ; 
but  as  the  matter  is  usually  weighty,  and  the  language  dignified 
and  varied,  the  play  of  antithesis  is  rather  an  agreeable  addition. 

To  illustrate  the  superior  dignity  and  finish  of  his  pointed  sen- 
tences, one  or  two  passages  may  be  quoted.  Our  quotations  under 
this  head  are  longer  than  usual,  because  this  is  really  the  chief 
distinction  of  the  author's  style. 

The  following  is  from  the  Preface  to  his  '  Observations  on  the 
United  Provinces.'  He  is  upholding  the  dignity  of  History : — 

"Nor  are  we  to  think  Princes  themselves  losers,  or  less  entertained, 
when  we  see  them  employ  their  time  and  their  thoughts  in  so  useful  specu- 
lations, and  to  so  glorious  ends  :  but  that  rather  thereby  they  attain  their 
true  prerogative  of  being  happier,  as  well  as  greater,  than  subjects  can  be. 
For  all  the  pleasures  of  sense  that  any  man  can  enjoy,  are  within  the  reach 
of  a  private  fortune  and  ordinary  contrivance  ;  grow  fainter  with  age,  and 
duller  with  use  ;  must  be  revived  with  intermissions,  and  wait  upon  the 
returns  of  appetite,  which  are  no  more  at  call  of  the  rich  than  the  poor. 
The  flashes  of  wit  and  good-humour  that  rise  from  the  vapours  of  wine,  are 
little  different  from  those  that  proceed  from  the  heats  of  blood  in  the  first' 
approaches  of  fevers  or  frenzies,  and  are  to  be  valued,  but  as  (indeed)  they 
are,  the  effects  of  distemper.  But  the  pleasures  of  imagination,  as  they 
heighten  and  refine  the  very  pleasures  of  sense,  so  they  are  of  larger  extent 
and  longer  duration ;  and  if  the  most  sensual  man  will  confess  there  is  a 
pleasure  in  pleasing,  he  must  likewise  allow  there  is  good  to  a  man's  self  in 
doing  good  to  others  :  and  the  further  this  extends  the  higher  it  rises,  and 
the  longer  it  lasts.  Besides,  there  is  beauty  in  order,  and  there  are  charms 
in  well-deserved  praise  :  and  both  are  the  greater  by  how  much  greater  the 
subject ;  as  the  first  appearing  in  a  well-framed  and  well-governed  state,  and 
the  other  arising  from  noble  and  generous  actions.  Nor  can  any  veins  of 
good-humour  be  greater  than  those  that  swell  by  the  success  of  wise  counsels, 
and  by  the  fortunate  events  of  public  affairs ;  since  a  man  that  takes  pleasure 
in  doing  good  to  ten  thousand,  must  needs  have  more  than  he  that  takes 
none  but  in  doing  good  to  himself." 

Our  next  passage  is  from  the  "  Original  and  Nature  of  Govern- 
ment," expounding  why  the  country  population  is  less  democratic 
than  the  town  : — 

"The  contrary  of  all  this  happens  in  countries  thin  inhabited,  and  espe- 
cially in  vast  Campanias,  such  as  are  extended  through  Asia  and  Afric, 
where  there  are  few  cities  besides  what  grow  by  the  residence  of  the  kings 
or  their  governors.  The  people  are  poorer,  and  having  little  to  lose,  have 
little  to  care  for,  and  are  less  exposed  to  the  designs  of  power  or  violence. 
The  assembling  of  persons,  deputed  from  people  at  great  distances  one  from 
another,  is  trouble  to  them  that  are  sent,  and  charge  to  them  that  seud^ 
And,  where  ambition  and  avarice  have  made  no  entrance,  the  desire  of  leisure 


SIR  WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  323 

is  much  more  natural  than  of  business  and  care  ;  besides,  men  conversing  all 
their  lives  with  the  woods,  and  the  fields,  and  the  herds,  more  than  with 
one  another,  come  to  know  as  little  as  they  desire  ;  use  their  senses  a 'great 
deal  more  than  their  reasons ;  examine  not  the  nature  or  the  tenure  of 
power  and  authority ;  find  only  they  are  tit  to  obey,  because  they  are  not 
fit  to  govern ;  and  so  come  to  submit  to  the  will  of  him  they  found  in 
power,  as  they  do  to  the  will  of  heaven,  and  consider  all  changes  of  con- 
ditions that  happen  to  them  under  good  or  bad  Princes,  like  good  or  ill 
seasons,  that  happen  in  the  weather  and  the  air. " 

His  letter  of  consolation  to  the  Countess  of  Essex  is  one  of  his 
most  finished  productions.  The  following  paragraph  illustrates  at 
once  the  rhythmical  finish  of  his  style  and  the  soundness  of  his 
judgment : — 

"  But,  Madam,  though  religion  were  no  party  in  your  case,  and  that  for 
so  violent  and  injurious  a  grief,  you  had  nothing  to  answer  to  God,  but  only 
to  the  world  and  yourself ;  yet,  I  very  much  doubt,  how  you  would  be 
acquitted.  We  bring  into  the  world  with  us  a  poor,  needy,  uncertain  life, 
short  at  the  longest,  and  unquiet  at  the  best ;  all  the  imaginations  of  the 
witty  and  the  wise  have  been  perpetually  busied  to  find  out  the  ways  how 
to  revive  it  with  pleasures,  or  relieve  it  with  diversions  ;  how  to  compose  it 
with  ease,  and  settle  it  with  safety.  To  some  of  these  ends  have  been  em- 
ployed the  institutions  of  lawgivers,  the  reasonings  of  philosophers,  the 
inventions  of  poets,  the  pains  of  labouring,  and  the  extravagances  of  volup- 
tuous men.  All  the  world  is  perpetually  at  work  about  nothing  else,  but 
only  that  our  poor  mortal  lives  should  pass  the  easier  and  happier  for  that 
little  time  we  possess  them,  or  else  end  the  better  when  we  lose  them.  Upon 
this  occasion,  riches  came  to  be  coveted,  honours  to  be  esteemed,  friendship 
and  love  to  be  pursued,  and  virtues  themselves  to  be  admired  in  the  world. 
Now,  Madam,  is  it  not  to  bid  defiance  to  all  mankind,  to  condemn  their 
universal  opinions  and  designs  ;  if,  instead  of  passing  your  life  as  well  and 
easily,  you  resolve  to  pass  it  as  ill  and  miserably  as  you  can  ?  You  grow 
insensible  to  the  conveniences  of  riches,  the  delights  of  honour  and  praise, 
the  charms  of  kindness  or  friend-hip,  nay  to  the  observance  or  applause  of 
virtues  themselves  ;  for  who  can  you  expect,  in  these  excesses  of  passion, 
will  allow  you  to  show  either  temperance  or  fortitude,  to  be  either  prudent  or 
just  ?  and  for  your  friends,  I  suppose  you  reckon  upon  losing  their  kindness, 
when  you  have  sufficiently  convinced  them,  they  can  never  hope  for  any  of 
yours,  since  you  have  none  left  for  yourself  or  anything  else.  You  declare 
upon  all  occasions,  you  are  incapable  of  receiving  any  comfort  or  pleasure  in 
anything  that  is  left  in  this  world  ;  and,  I  assure  you,  Madam,  none  can  ever 
love  you  that  can  have  no  hopes  ever  to  please  you." 

The  following  is  a  balanced  comparison  between  Homer  and 
Virgil;  the  order  is  well  kept  up: — 

"  Homer  was,  without  dispute,  the  most  universal  genius  that  has  been 
known  in  the  world,  and  Virgil  the  most  accomplished.  To  the  first  must 
be  allowed  the  most  fertile  invention,  the  richest  vein,  the  most  general 
knowledge,  and  the  most  lively  expression  ;  to  the  last,  the  noblest  ideas, 
the  justest  institution,  the  wisest  conduct,  and  the  choicest  elocution.  To 
speak  in  the  painter's  terms,  we  find,  in  the  works  of  Homer,  the  most  spirit, 
force,  and  life ;  in  those  of  Virgil,  the  best  design,  the  truest  proportions, 
and  the  greatest  grace  ;  the  colouring  in  both  seems  equal,  and  indeed  is  in 
both  admirable.  Homer  had  more  tire  and  rapture,  Virgil  more  light  and 


324  FROM   1670   TO   1700. 

•wiftness  ;  or  at  least  the  poetical  fire  was  more  raging  in  one,  but  clearer  in 
the  other,  which  makes  the  first  more  amazing,  and  the  latter  more  agreeable. 
The  ore  was  richer  in  one,  but  in  the  other  more  refined,  and  better  allayed 
to  make  up  excellent  work.  Upon  the  whole,  I  think  it  must  be  confessed, 
that  Homer  was  of  the  two,  and  perhaps  of  all  others,  the  vastest,  the 
sublitnest,  and  the  most  wonderful  genius  ;  and  that  he  has  been  generally 
so  esteemed,  there  cannot  be  a  greater  testimony  given,  than  what  has  been 
by  some  observed,  that  not  only  the  greatest  masters  have  found  in  his  works 
the  best  and  truest  principles  of  all  their  sciences  or  arts,  but  that  the 
noblest  nations  have  derived  from  them  the  original  of  their  several  races, 
though  it  be  hardly  yet  agreed  whether  his  story  be  true  or  a  fiction.  In 
short,  these  two  immortal  poets  must  be  allowed  to  have  so  much  excelled 
in  their  kinds,  as  to  have  exceeded  all  comparison,  to  have  even  extin- 
guished emulation,  and  in  a  manner  confined  true  poetry,  not  only  to  their 
two  languages,  but  to  their  very  persons." 

We  have  noticed  only  the  merits  of  Temple's  sentences.  These 
are  not  uniformly  sustained.  The  sentence- structure  of  his  '  Mem- 
oirs'  is  not  so  good.  Our  quotations  are  fair  specimens  of  his 
general  style,  and  even  they  have  not  the  grammatical  accuracy 
and  finish  that  Johnson  introduced  into  the  language.  In  his 
'  Memoirs '  he  aims  at  Thucydidean  compactness  and  brevity,  and 
BO  fails  into  the  error  of  condensations  that  are  too  forced,  and 
sentences  that  are  deficient  in  unity.  I  shall  quote  the  most  faulty 
condensation  that  I  Lave  observed : — 

"This,  I  suppose,  gave  the  occasion  for  reflections  upon  what  had  passed 
in  the  course  of  my  former  embassies  in  Holland  and  at  Aix ;  and  his 
Majesty,  and  his  ministers,  the  resolution  to  send  for  me  out  of  my  private 
retreat,  where  I  hail  passed  two  years  (as  I  intended  to  do  the  rest  of  my 
life),  and  to  engage  me  in  going  over  into  Holland,  to  make  the  separate 
peace  with  that  State." 

Paragraphs. — Our  author  has  a  certain  apprehension,  however 
faint,  of  paragraph  method.  If  we  except  Fuller,  he  makes  his 
paragraphs  more  orderly  and  consecutive  than  any  writer  before 
Johnson.  His  Essay  on  the  'Original  and  Nature  of  Govern- 
ment '  is  a  favourable  example  of  his  method.  He  has  five  large 
breaks,  at  each  of  which  he  introduces  a  new  proposition.  But 
the  passages  between  the  breaks  are  far  from  being  perfectly  con- 
secutive, or  strictly  confined  to  the  subject  enounced  in  the  first 
proposition ;  although,  to  do  them  justice,  they  are  quite  as  orderly 
as  many  compositions  of  much  later  date.  As  an  example  of  the 
minuter  paragraph  arrangement,  may  be  quoted  one  of  these  larger 
divisions.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  first  paragraph  is  not  a  com- 
plete introduction,  and  that  towards  the  end  the  arrangement  be- 
comes more  confused : — 

"Authority  arises  from  the  opinion  of  wisdom,  goodness,  and  valour  In 
the  persons  who  possess  it. 

"  Wisdom  is  that  which  makes  men  judge  what  are  the  best  ends,  and 
what  tint  best  means  to  attain  them  ;  and  gives  a  man  advantage  among  the 


SIR   WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  325 

weak  and  the  ignorant ;  as  sight  among  the  blind,  which  is  that  of  counsel 
and  direction;  this  gives  authority  to  age  among  the  younger,  till  these 
begin  at  certain  years  to  change  their  opinion  of  the  old  and  of  themselves. 
This  gives  it  more  absolute  to  a  pilot  at  sea,  whom  all  the  passengers  suffer 
to  steer  them  as  he  pleases. 

' '  Goodness  is  that  which  makes  men  prefer  their  duty  and  their  promise, 
before  their  passions  or  their  interest ;  and  is  properly  the  object  of  trust : 
in  our  language  it  goes  rather  by  the  name  of  honesty  ;  though  what  we  call 
an  honest  man,  the  Romans  call  a  good  man  ;  and  honesty  in  their  language, 
as  well  as  in  French,  rather  signifies  a  composition  of  those  qualities  which 
generally  acquire  honour  and  esteem  to  those  who  possess  them. 

"  Valour,  as  it  gives  awe,  and  promises  protection  to  those  who  want  either 
heart  or  strength  to  defend  themselves :  this  makes  the  authority  of  men 
among  women  ;  and  that  of  a  master-buck  in  a  numerous  herd,  though  per- 
haps not  strong  enough  for  any  two  of  them  ;  but  the  impression  of  single 
fear  holds  when  they  are  all  together  by  the  ignorance  of  uniting. 

"  Eloquence,  as  it  passes  for  a  mark  of  wisdom  ;  beauty  of  goodness,  and 
nobility  of  valour  (which  was  its  original)  have  likewise  ever  some  effect 
upon  the  opinion  of  the  people  ;  but  a  very  great  one,  when  they  are  really 
joined  with  the  qualities  they  promise  or  resemble. 

"  There  is  yet  another  source  from  which  usually  springs  greater  authority 
than  from  all  the  rest ;  which  is  the  opinion  of  divine  favour,  or  designation 
of  the  persons  or  of  the  races  that  govern.  This  made  the  kings  among  the 
heathens  ever  derive  themselves,  or  their  ancestors,  from  some  god ;  passing 
thereby  for  heroes — that  is,  persons  issued  from  the  mixture  of  divine  and 
human  race,  and  of  a  middle  nature  between  gods  and  men ;  others  joined 
the  mitre  to  the  crown,  and  thereby  the  reverence  of  divine,  to  the  respect 
of  civil  power. 

"  This  made  the  Caliphs  of  Persia  and  Egypt,  &c. 

"  Piety,  as  it  is  thought  a  way  to  the  favour  of  God,  and  fortune,  as  it 
looks  like  the  effect  either  of  that,  or  at  least  of  prudence  and  courage,  beget 
authority.  As  likewise  splendour  of  living  in  great  palaoes,  with  numerous 
attendance,  much  observance,  and  rich  habits  differing  from  common  men : 
both  as  it  seems  to  be  the  reward  of  those  virtues  already  named,  or  the  effect 
of  fortune  ;  or  as  it  is  a  mark  of  being  obeyed  by  many. 

"  From  all  these  authority  arises,  but  is  by  nothing  so  much  strengthened 
and  confirmed  as  by  custom,"  &c. 

Figures  of  Speech — Similitudes. — Temple  and  Cowley  did  much 
to  confirm  the  reaction  against  the  indiscriminate  figurative  pro- 
fusion of  the  preceding  generations.  Neither  can  be  called  ornate. 
But  while  they  agree  in  using  similitudes  \\ith  moderation,  they 
differ  widely  in  another  respect.  Temple's  similitudes  are  much 
more  apt  and  striking  than  Cowley's,  and  have  not  the  same 
appearance  of  being  fetched  from  a  distance.  They  are  not  light 
ornaments,  but  substantial  additions,  having  usually  both  an  illus- 
trative and  an  emotional  force. 

One  or  two  examples  may  be  quoted.  Remarking  on  the  in- 
terest attaching  to  the  United  Provinces,  he  says  : — 

"And  such  a  revolution  as  has  since  happened  there,  though  it  may  hava 
made  these  discourses  a  little  important  to  his  Majesty  or  his  council ;  yet  it 
will  not  have  rendered  them  less  agreeable  to  common  eyes,  who,  like  men 


326  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

that  lire  near  the  sea,  will  run  out  upon  the  cliffs  to  gaze  at  it  in  a  storm, 
though  they  would  not  look  out  of  their  window  to  see  it  in  a  calm." 

"  I  knew  and  esteemed  a  person  abroad,  who  used  to  say,  a  man  must  ha 
a  mean  wretch  that  desired  to  live  after  threescore  years  old.  But  so  much, 
I  doubt,  is  certain,  that,  in  life,  as  in  wine,  he  that  will  drink  it  good,  must 
not  draw  it  to  the  dregs. " 

"  I  hare  said  that  the  excellency  of  genius  must  be  native,  because  it  can 
never  grow  to  any  great  height  if  it  be  only  acquired  or  affected :  but  it  must 
be  ennobled  by  birth  to  give  it  more  lustre,  esteem,  and  authority ;  it  must 
be  cultivated  by  education  and  instruction,  to  improve  its  growth,  and  direct 
its  end  and  application ;  and  it  must  be  assisted  by  fortune,  to  preserve  it 
to  maturity.  .  .  .  Now,  since  so  many  stars  go  to  the  making  up  of 
this  constellation,  'tis  no  wonder  it  has  so  seldom  appeared  in  the  world  ;  nor 
that  when  it  does,  it  is  received  and  followed  with  so  much  gazing,  and  so 
much  veneration." 

Contrast. — We  have  seen  that  Temple  makes  abundant  use  of 
antithesis,  and  that  he  studies  how  to  give  antithesis  effective  point. 
In  this  place  we  may  quote  some  examples  where  the  antithesis  is 
more  paradoxical  and  epigram  matic.  His  antitheses  very  often 
have  an  epigrammatic  turn : — 

"  The  subsidies  from  France  bore  no  proportion  to  the  charge  of  our  fleets ; 
and  our  strength  at  sea  seemed  rather  lessened  than  increased  by  the  con- 
junction of  theirs  :  our  seamen  fought  without  heart,  and  were  more  afraid 
of  their  friends  than  their  enemies ;  and  our  discontents  were  so  great  at 
land,  that  the  assembling  of  our  militia  to  defend  our  coasts  was  thought  as 
dangerous  as  an  invasion." 

Concerning  the  Cabal,  he  drily  remarks — "And  thus,  instead 
of  making  so  great  a  king  as  they  pretended  by  this  Dutch  War 
and  French  Alliance,  they  had  the  honour  of  making  only  four 
great  subjects." 

The  Dutch  having  inundated  their  country  to  check  the  French 
invasion,  he  says  that  "  they  found  no  way  of  saving  their  country 
but  by  losing  it" 

"Some  ages  produce  many  great  men  and  few  great  occasions;  other 
times,  on  the  contrary,  raise  great  occasions  but  few  or  no  great  men." 

"Following  this  uncertain  course,  they  succeeded,  as  such  counsels  must 
ever  do :  instead  of  pleasing  all,  they  pleased  none  ;  and,  aiming  to  leave  no 
enemies  to  their  settlement  of  Ireland,  they  left  it  no  friends." 

Climax. — Our  author's  grave  composed  style  is  as  far  as  possible 
opposed  to  abrupt  and  startling  figures  of  speech,  exclamation, 
apostrophe,  and  suchlike.  It  is  all  the  more  compatible  with  the 
careful  building  up  of  climaxes.  The  reader  will  notice  a  steady 
graduation  and  culmination  in  every  passage  where  the  subject 
calls  1'or  more  than  iu>ual  stateliness.  See  under  Strength,  p.  329. 


SIR   WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  32'| 


QUALITIES   OF   STYLB. 

Simplicity. — This  quality  is  incompatible  with  the  dignity  and 
elevation  of  Temple's  style.  His  diction  is  very  different  from  the 
light  familiar  diction  of  Cowley. 

In  one  respect  he  is  more  simple  than  Cowley.  He  is  thoroughly  _ 
free  from  the  pedantry  of  superfluous  Latin  quotations.  This  does 
credit  to  his  taste ;  he  was  a  scholar,  and  might  have  quoted. 
Dryden  quotes  a  little,  and  probably  would  have  quoted  more  had 
he  possessed  the  requisite  scholarship.  No  scholarly  writer  before 
Johnson  makes  so  few  Latin  quotations  as  Templa 

In  the  choice  and  treatment  of  subjects,  he  departs  from  the 
easy  and  familiar  tracks.  An  Essay  on  the  "  Original  and  Nature 
of  Government "  cannot  be  made  so  light  and  entertaining  as  an 
essay  on  Ambition.  On  subjects  not  naturally  abstruse — in  the 
'  Memoirs '  of  his  diplomacy  and  in  his  '  Observations  on  the  United 
Provinces,'  he  writes  with  two  aims  more  or  less  antagonistic  to 
popular  treatment — a  desire  to  be  thorough  and  a  desire  to  be 
brief.  He  is  not  content  with  mentioning  the  chief  and  obvious 
circumstances  that  concur  to  an  event ;  while  his  compact  pages 
want  the  easy  diffuseness  of  picturesque  details.  In  this  last 
respect  particularly  he  differs  from  the  popular  historians  and 
essayists  of  our  century :  he  condenses  both  narrative  and  exposi- 
tion at  least  three  times  as  much. 

Clearness  is  a  distinguishing  quality  of  our  author's  style.  He 
is  both  perspicuous  and  precise.  We  have  spoken  of  the  com- 
paratively good  order  of  his  paragraphs.  His  precision,  for  one 
whose  works  are  not  upon  technical  subjects,  is  no  less  remarkable. 
Writing  with  leisure  and  composure,  he  calmly  chooses  the  aptest 
words  and  similitudes ;  sober  and  sagacious,  he  seldom  leaves  his 
meaning  open  to  doubt. 

We  have  already,  remarked  the  propriety  of  his  similitudes. 
That  he  squared  the  circumstances  of  a  comparison  deliberately 
and  not  by  accident,  would  appear  from  the  following  manipu- 
lation of  a  commonplace: — 

"  The  comparison  between  a  State  and  a  ship  has  been  so  illustrated  by 
poets  and  orators  that  'tis  hard  to  find  any  point  wherein  they  ditt'er  ;  and 
yet  they  seem  to  do  it  in  this,  that,  in  great  storms  and  rough  seas,  if  all 
the  men  and  lading  roll  to  one  side,  the  ship  will  be  in  danger  of  oversetting 
by  their  weight :  but,  on  the  contrary,  in  the  storms  of  State,  if  the  body  of 
the  people,  witli  the  bulk  of  estates,  roll  on  one  way,  the  nation  will  be  safe.' 
For  the  rest,  the  similitude  holds." 

He  shows  great  steadiness  in  keeping  close  to  facts,  rising  above 
verbal  quibbling,  and  calmly  setting  aside  misleading  associations. 
His  rejection  of  the  factitious  simplicity  of  the  scholastic  division 


328  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

of  governments  into  Monarchies,  Aristocracies,  and  Democracies, 
showed  no  small  power  of  looking  beneath  the  surface  to  the  un- 
derlying distinctions :  his  more  accurate  division  was  unheeded 
until  revived  and  made  precise  by  recent  authorities.  Many 
examples  might  be  quoted  of  his  steady  superiority  to  plausible 
appearances  and  irrelevant  disputes.  The  beginning  of  his  essay 
on  Poetry  is  not  perhaps  the  best,  but  here  it  is : — 

"  The  two  common  shrines,  to  which  most  offer  up  the  application  of  their 
thoughts  and  their  lives,  are  profit  and  pleasure  ;  and  by  their  devotions  to 
either  of  these  they  are  vulgarly  distinguished  into  two  sects,  and  called 
either  busy  or  idle  men.  Whether  these  terms  differ  in  meaning  err  only 
in  sound,  I  know  very  well  may  be  disputed,  and  with  appearance  enough, 
since  the  covetous  man  takes  perhaps  as  much  pleasure  in  his  gains  as  the 
voluptuous  does  in  his  luxury,  and  would  not  pursue  his  business,  unless  he 
were  pleased  with  it,  upon  the  last  account  of  what  he  most  wishes  and  de- 
sires, nor  would  care  for  the  increase  of  his  fortunes,  unless  he  thereby  pro- 
posed that  of  his  pleasures  too,  in  one  kind  or  other  ;  so  that  pleasure  may 
be  said  to  be  his  end,  whether  he  will  allow  to  find  it  in  his  pursuit  or  no. 
Much  ado  there  has  been,  many  words  spent,  or  (to  speak  with  more  respect 
to  the  ancient  philosophers)  many  disputes  have  been  raised  upon  this  argu- 
ment, I  think  to  little  purpose,  and  that  all  has  been  rather  an  exercise  of 
wit,  than  enquiry  after  truth  ;  and  all  controversies,  that  can  never  end,  had 
better  perhaps  never  begin.  The  best  perhaps  is  to  take  words  as  they  are 
most  commonly  spoken  and  meant,  like  coin,  as  it  most  currently  passes, 
without  raising  scruples  upon  the  weight  of  the  alloy,  unless  the  cheat  or 
the  defect  be  gross  and  evident.  Few  things  in  the  world,  or  none,  will  bear 
too  much  refining  ;  a  thread  too  fine  spun  will  easily  break,  and  the  point  of 
a  needle  too  finely  filed.  The  usual  acceptation  takes  profit  and  pleasure 
for  two  different  things,  and  not  only  calls  the  followers  or  votaries  of  them 
by  several  names  of  busy  and  of  idle  men,  but  distinguishes  the  faculties  of 
the  mind  that  are  conversant  about  them,  calling  the  operations  of  the  first 
wisdom,  and  of  the  other  wit.  ...  To  the  first  of  these  are  attributed 
the  inventions  or  productions  of  things  generally  esteemed  the  most  neces- 
sary, useful,  or  profitable  to  human  life,  either  in  private  possessions  or 
public  institutions  :  to  the  other,  those  writings  or  discourses  which  are  the 
most  pleasing  or  entertaining  to  all  that  read  or  hear  them. " 

The  following  passage  may  be  contrasted  with  Carlyle's  theory 
of  laughter : — 

"If  it"  (laughter)  "were  always  an  expression  of  good-humom  or  being 
pleased,  we  should  have  reason  to  value  ourselves  more  upon  it;  but  'tis 
moved  by  such  different  and  contrary  objects  and  affections,  that  it  has 
gained  little  esteem,  since  we  laugh  at  folly  as  well  as  wit,  at  accidents  that 
vex  us  sometimes,  as  well  as  others  that  pli-ase  us,  and  at  the  malice  of  apes, 
as  well  as  the  innocence  of  children  ;  and  the  things  that  please  us  most,  are 
apt  to  make  other  sorts  of  motions  both  in  our  faces  and  hearts,  and  very 
different  from  those  of  laughter." 

Strength. — Our  author's  style  has  a  certain  animation,  arising 
chiefly  from  brevity  and  point.  This  is  less  felt  in  the  severely 
didactic  works,  partly  because  the  reader's  attention  is  more 
heavily  taxed,  and  partly  because  the  writer,  having  an  eye  to 


SIR  WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  329 

the  main  object  of  presenting  the  facts,  is  less  able  to  attend  to 
charms  of  expression.  It  is  more  decidedly  pleasing  in  hia 
Letters,  and  in  the  lively  essay  on  the  "  Cure  of  the  Gout," 
which  also  is  in  the  form  of  a  letter. 

Not  animation,  however,  but  dignity,  is  the  ruling  character- 
istic. Of  the  general  composure  and  elevation  of  his  tone,  the 
reader  will  judge  best  from  passages  quoted  without  an  eye  to  this 
particular  quality.  When  the  subject  requires  a  more  intense  or 
a  loftier  tone,  he  answers  easily  to  the  call,  providing  harnioni- 
oxis  language  and  imagery  without  any  appearance  of  straining. 
Thus— 

"I  have  sometimes  thought,  how  it  should  have  come  to  pass,  that  the 
infinite  swarm  of  that  vast  northern  hive,  which  so  often  shook  the  world 
like  a  great  tempest,  and  overtlowed  it  like  a  torrent ;  changing  names,  and 
customs,  and  government,  and  language,  and  the  very  face  of  nature,  wher- 
ever they  seated  themselves;  which,  upon  record  of  story,  under  the  name 
of  Gauls,  pierced  into  Greece  and  Italy,  sacking  Rome,  and  besieging  the 
Capitol  in  Camillus's  time ;  under  that  of  the  Cimbers,  marched  through 
France  to  the  very  confines  of  Italy,  defended  by  Alarms  ;  under  that  of  Huns 
or  Lombards,  Visigoths,  Goths,  and  Vandals,  conquered  the  whole  forces  of 
the  Roman  empire,  sacked  Rome  thrice  in  a  small  compass  of  years,  seated 
three  kingdoms  in  Spain  and  Afric,  as  well  as  Loml>ardy  ;  and  under  that 
of  Danes  or  Normans,  possessed  themselves  of  England,  a  great  part  of 
France,  and  even  of  Naples  and  Sicily:  how  (I  say)  these  nations,  which 
seemed  to  spawn  in  every  age,  and  at  some  intervals  of  time  discharged  their 
own  native  countries  of  so  vast  numbers,  and  with  such  terror  to  the  world, 
should,  about  seven  or  eight  hundred  years  ago,  leave  off  the  use  of  these 
furious  expeditions,  as  if  on  a  sudden  they  should  have  grown  barren,  or 
tame,  or  better  contented  with  their  own  ill  climates." 

Again,  describing  the  spread  of  Mohammedanism : — 

"  To  be  short,  this  contagion  was  so  violent,  that  it  spread  from  Arabia 
into  Egypt  and  Syria,  and  his  power  increased  with  such  a  sudden  growth 
as  well  as  his  doctrine,  that  he  lived  to  see  them  overspread  both  those  coun- 
tries, and  a  great  part  of  Persia ;  the  decline  of  the  old  Roman  empire  mak- 
ing easy  way  for  the  powerful  ascent  of  this  new  comet,  that  appeared  with 
such  wonder  and  terror  in  the  world,  and  with  a  flaming  sword,  made  way 
wherever  it  came,  or  laid  all  desolate  that  opposed  it." 

The  following  long  sentence  may  be  quoted  as  an  example  of 
sustained  strength.  No  ordinary  resources  of  language  are  needed 
to  prevent  a  break-down  in  the  conclusion  of  what  opens  with 
such  grandeur.  He  is  moralising  on  the  victorious  invasion  of 
the  Netherlands  by  Louis  XIV. : — 

"  When  we  consider  such  a  power  and  wealth,  as  was  related  in  the  last 
chapter,  to  have  fallen  in  a  manner  prostrate  within  the  space  of  one  month  ; 
BO  many  frontier  towns,  renowned  in  the  sieges  and  actions  of  the  Spanish 
wars,  entered  like  open  villages  by  the  French  troops,  without  defence  or 
almost  denial ;  most  of  them  without  any  blows  at  all,  and  all  of  them  with 
BO  few ;  their  great  rivers  that  were  esteemed  an  invincible  security  to  the 
l>roviu:us  of  Holland  and  Utrecht,  passed  with  as  much  ease,  and  as  small 


330  FKOM   1670  TO   1700. 

resistance,  as  little  fords ;  and  in  short,  the  very  heart  of  a  nation,  ao  valiant 
of  old  against  Rome,  so  obstinate  against  Spain,  now  subdued,  and  in  a 
manner  abandoning  all  before  their  danger  appeared :  we  may  justly  have 
our  recourse  to  the  secret  nnd  fixed  periods  of  all  human  greatness,  for 
the  account  of  such  a  revolution  ;  or  rather  to  the  unsearchable  decrees 
and  irresistible  force  of  divine  Providence ;  though  it  seems  not  more 
impious  to  question  it,  than  to  measure  it  by  our  scale  ;  or  reduce  the 
issues  and  motions  of  that  eternal  will  and  power  to  a  conformity  with 
what  is  esteemed  just,  or  wise,  or  good,  by  the  usual  consent  or  the  narrow 
comprehension  of  poor  mortal  men." 

Pathos. — In  his  grave  treatises  he  is  too  composed  and  stately 
for  the  lively  expression  of  affection,  sorrow,  or  a  fresh  sense  of 
beauty.  Yet  he  never  passes  by  a  touching  occasion  without 
some  sign  of  feeling.  The  mood  of  the  writer  appears  in  the 
temperate  and  refined  mournfulness  of  the  language.  Thus — 

"The  noblest  spirit  of  genius  in  the  world,  if  it  falls,  though  never  so 
bravely,  in  its  first  enterprises,  cannot  deserve  enough  of  mankind  to  pre- 
tend to  so  great  a  reward  as  the  esteem  of  heroic  virtue.  And  yet  perhaps 
many  a  person  has  died  in  the  first  battle  or  adventure  he  achieved,  and 
lies  buried  in  silence  and  oblivion ;  who,  had  he  outlived  as  many  dangers 
as  Alexander  did,  might  have  shiued  as  bright  in  honour  and  fame." 

"  When  all  is  done,  human  life  is,  at  the  greatest  and  the  best,  but  like  a 
froward  ehi'd,  that  must  be  played  with  and  humoured  a  little  to  keep  it 
quiet  till  it  falls  asleep,  and  then  the  care  is  over." 

Wit. — As  under  Strength  passages  may  be  singled  out  where 
the  grave  vigour  and  dignity  of  his  style  gains  the  ascendancy, 
and  soars  into  a  loftier  strain,  so  under  Wit  we  may  single  out 
passages  where  his  pointed  animation  gains  the  ascendancy,  and 
becomes  keener  and  more  sparkling. 

He  is  too  grave  and  temperate  to  turn  anybody  or  anything  into 
violent  ridicule.  The  fine  flavour  of  polished  wit  is  always  upper- 
most. The  following  is  an  example  : — 

"A  man  that  tells  me  my  opinions  are  absurd  or  ridiculous,  impertinent 
or  unreasonable,  because  they  differ  from  his,  seems  to  intend  a  quarrel  in- 
stead of  a  dispute,  and  calls  me  fool  or  madman  with  a  little  more  circum- 
stance, though,  perhaps,  I  pass  for  one  as  well  in  my  senses  as  he,  aa 
pertinent  in  talk,  and  as  prudent  in  life ;  yet  these  are  the  common  civili- 
ties, in  religious  argument,  of  sufficient  and  conceited  men,  who  talk  much 
of  right  reason,  and  mean  always  their  own  ;  and  make  their  private  imag- 
ination the  measure  of  general  truth.  But  such  language  determines  all 
between  us,  and  the  dispute  conies  to  end  in  three  words  at  last,  which  it 
might  as  well  have  ended  in  at  first,  That  he  is  in  the  right,  and  I  am  iu 
the  wrong." 

Examples  of  his  more  genial  point  are  to  be  found  chiefly  in 
his  letters.  The  essay  on  the  "Cure  of  the  Gout"  is  written 
in  a  sprightly  vein.  For  example : — 

"  All  these  things  put  together,  with  what  a  great  physician  writes  of 
cures  by  whipping  with  rods,  and  another  with  holly,  and  by  other  cruel- 


SIR   WILLIAM   TEMPLE.  331 

ties  of  cutting  and  burning,  made  me  certainly  conclude,  that  the  gout  was 
a  companion  that  ought,  to  he  treated  like  an  enemy,  and  by  no  means  like 
a  friend,  and  that  grew  troublesome  chiefly  by  good  usage  ;  and  this  was 
confirmed  to  me  by  considering  that  it  haunted  usually  the  easy  and  the 
rich,  the  nice  and  the  lazy,  who  grow  to  endure  much,  because  they  can 
endure  little ;  that  make  much  of  it  as  soon  as  it  comes,  and  yet  leave  not 
making  much  of  themselves  too  ;  that  take  care  to  carry  it  presently  to  bed, 
and  keep  it  safe  and  warm,  and  indeed  lay  up  the  gout  for  two  or  three 
Months,  while  they  give  out  that  the  gout  lays  up  them.  On  the  other 
side  it  hanlly  approaches  the  rough  and  the  poor,  such  as  labour  for  meat, 
and  eat  only  for  hunger ;  that  drink  water,  either  pure  or  but  discoloured 
with  malt ;  that  know  no  use  of  wine,  but  for  a  cordial,  as  it  is,  and  per- 
haps was  only  intended :  or  if  such  men  happen  by  their  native  constitu- 
tions to  fall  into  the  gout,  either  they  mind  it  not  at  all,  having  no  leisure 
to  be  sick  ;  or  they  use  it  like  a  dog,  they  walk  on,  or  they  toil  and  work  as 
they  did  before,  they  keep  it  wet  and  cold  ;  or  if  they  are  laid  up,  they  are 
perhaps  forced  by  that  to  fast  more  than  before,  and  if  it  lasts,  they  grow 
impatient,  and  fall  to  beat  it,  or  whip  it,  or  cut  it,  or  burn  it;  and  all  this 
while,  perhaps,  never  know  the  very  name  of  gout. " 

Taste. — As  might  be  inferred  from  his  character,  our  author's 
style  is  very  •  highly  refined.  Affectation  of  terms  or  phrases, 
abruptness,  extravagance,  maudlin  sentimentality,  coarse  invec- 
tive, are  as  foreign  as  may  be  to  his  characteristic  manner.  If 
the  standard  of  a  good  English  style  is  the  style  that  shall  please 
the  majority  of  educated  Englishmen,  he  errs  on  the  side  of  too 
great  refinement.  In  many  respects  he  is  a  contrast  to  Macaulay, 

still  more  to  Carlyle. 

t 

KINDS   OP   COMPOSITION, 

Narrative. — In  a  preface  to  the  third  part  of  Temple's  '  Mem- 
oirs,' Swift  claims  lain  as  the  first  Englishman  "  (at  least  of 
any  consequence)  who  ever  attempted  that  manner  of  writing.", 
Though  it  is  a  personal  record,  the  style,  as  already  noticed,  is  not 
gossipping  and  diffuse,  but  on  the  contrary  compact  and  brief  to 
the  verge  of  abstruseness.  As  the  principal  actor  in  some  of  the 
transactions,  he  had  exceptional  advantages  for  knowing  the  hid. 
den  springs  of  events. 

At  one  time  he  intended  to  write  a  History  of  England,  having 
often  felt  the  want  of  a  good  general  history,  and  being  far  from 
satisfied  with  the  Chroniclers.  Obliged  by  pressure  of  other  em- 
ployments to  abandon  this  design,  he  completed  an  'Introduction 
to  the  History  of  England,'  "  from  the  first  originals,  as  far  as  he 
tould  find  any  ground  of  probable  story,  or  of  fair  conjecture," 
''  through  the  great  and  memorable  changes  of  names,  people, 
customs,  and  laws  that  passed  here,  until  the  end  of  the  first 
Norman  reign."  The  work  is  instructive,  abounding  in  sagacious 
criticism  of  social  and  political  institutions.  It  is  interesting  to 
contrast  his  views  of  history  with  Macaulay's : —  .j 


332  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

"  I  have  likewise  omitted  the  accounts  and  remarks  wherein  some  writers 
have  busied  their  pens,  of  strange  comets,  inclemencies  of  seasons,  raging 
diseases,  or  deplorable  tires  that  are  said  to  have  happened  in  this  age  and 
kingdom  ;  and  are  represented  by  some  as  judgments  of  God  upon  the  king's 
reign,  because  I  rather  esteem  them  accidents  of  time  or  chance,  such  as 
happen  in  one  part  or  other  of  the  world,  perhaps  every  age,  at  some  periods 
of  time,  or  from  some  influence  of  stars,  or  by  the  conspiring  of  some  natu- 
ral or  casual  circumstances,  and  neither  argue  the  virtues  or  vices  of  princes, 
nor  serve  for  example  or  instruction  to  posterity,  which  are  the  great  ends 
of  history,  and  ought  to  be  the  chief  care  of  all  historians." 

His  '  Observations  upon  the  United  Provinces  of  the  Nether- 
lands '  is  an  example  of  a  conspectus,  or  general  view  of  a  state  of 
society  in  all  its  parts  at  a  particular  time.  It  is  a  model  of  pains- 
taking observation  and  search,  and  is  full  of  sagacious  remarks. 
After  recounting  the  rise  and  progress  of  the  Federation,  he 
delineates  their  condition  towards  1672  under  six  heads  : — their 
Government,  their  Situation,  their  People  and  Dispositions,  their 
Religion,  their  Trade,  their  Forces  and  Revenues.  The  perform- 
ance is  very  different  from  the  third  chapter  of  Macaulay's 
History.  It  is  as  severely  didactic  and  thorough  as  Macaulay'a 
is  pictorial  and  superficial. 

JOHN  DBYDEN,   1631-1700. 

From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  his  poetical  career,  Dryden, 
not  content  to  leave  his  works  to  the  chances  of  criticism,  loved 
to  defend  in  prose  his  principles  of  composition,  and  issued  hardly 
anything  without  an  apologetic  or  explanatory  preface  or  dedica- 
tion. In  this  casual  form  he  has  left  some  ingenious  special 
pleading  for  his  own  practice,  as  well  as  many  valuable  remarks 
on  his  predecessors,  and  interesting  comparisons  of  the  most 
eminent  names.  Besides  these  stray  pieces,  he  published,  in 
1668,  a  formal  'Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy' — "a  little  discourse 
in  dialogue,  for  the  most  part  borrowed  from  the  observations 
of  others " — which,  says  Johnson,  "  was  the  first  regular  and 
valuable  treatise  on  the  art  of  writing."  It  is  now  interesting 
chiefly  for  its  defence  of  rhyming  in  tragedies — a  style  abandoned 
in  the  author's  later  works.  It  also  contains  some  clever  argu- 
ment in  favour  of  the  superiority  of  modern  to  ancient  play- 
writers. 

After  his  conversion  to  the  Catholic  Church,  he  was  employed 
by  James  II.  to  defend  against  Stillingfleet  a  paper  found  in  the 
strong-box  of  the  deceased  king,  purporting  to  be  written  by  the 
Duchess  of  York  in  explanation  of  her  departure  from  the  Pro- 
testant faith.  In  this  controversy  there  was-  little  that  could  be 
called  argument  on  either  side — it  was  very  much  like  other  con- 
troversies of  that  time,  a  pitched  battle  of  abuse ;  and  Dryden,  in 


JOHN    PRYDEN.  833 

the  exuberant  and  careless  "  horseplay  "  of  his  raillery,  laid  himself 
fatally  open  to  the  cool  retorts  of  his  antagonist. 

In  the  list  of  his  prose  works  are  included  two  translations  from 
the  French — Bouhours'  'Life  of  Francis  Xavier'  (1687),  and  Du 
Fresnoy's  'Art  of  Painting'  (1695).  He  also  wrute  the  life  of 
Plutarch  prefixed  to  what  is  known  as  '  Dryden's  Translation '  of 
Plutarch's  Lives.  But  the  only  prose  works  of  his  that  are  now 
read  are  his  Prefaces  and  the  '  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy.' 

The  fact  that  these  are  still  worth  reading  has  been  fixed  in  om 
minds  by  Byron's  happy  doggerel  lines — 

"  Read  all  the  Prefaces  of  Dryden, 
For  these  the  critics  much  confide  in, 
Though  only  writ  at  first  for  filling, 
To  raise  the  volume's  price  a  shilling." 

Dryden's  prose,  as  well  as  Temple's,  is  a  marked  improvement 
on  the  prose  of  the  Commonwealth  generation.  His  expressions 
have  not  the  curious  felicity  of  Cowley's ;  but  the  sentences  are 
much  more  flowing.  He  displays  to  some  extent  what  Dr  Blair 
considered  such  a  beauty  in  Temple's  composition — the  "  har- 
monious pause,"  the  measured  sentence  of  several  members.  He 
aims  very  much  at  antithetic  point,  reserving  emphatic  statements 
for  the  close  of  the  sentence,  and  practising  occasionally  the  abrupt 
introduction  of  a  general  statement  before  its  application  is  known. 
The  peculiarities  of  his  sentence-structure  may  be  studied  in  the 
following  extract  from  his  Preface  to  '  Absalom  and  Achitophel,' 
published  in  1681 :  in  it  we  see  the  rudiments  of  certain  abrupt 
arts  of  style  more  fully  developed  by  Johnson  and  Macaulay : — 

"It  is  not  my  intention  to  make  an  apology  for  my  poem  :  some  will 
think  it  needs  no  excuse,  and  others  will  receive  none.  The  design,  I  am 
sure,  is  honest ;  but  he  who  draws  his  pen  for  one  party  must  expect  to 
make  enemies  of  the  other:  for  wit  and  fool  are  consequents  of  Whig  and 
Tory  ;  and  every  man  is  a  knave  or  an  ass  to  the  contrary  side.  There  is  a 
treasury  of  merit  in  the  Fanatic  church,  as  well  as  in  the  Popish,  and  a 
pennyworth  to  be  had  of  saintship,  honesty,  and  poetry,  for  the  lewd,  the 
factious,  and  the  blockheads  :  but  the  longest  chapter  in  Deuteronomy  has 
not  curses  enough  for  an  Anti-Bromingham.  My  comfort  is,  their  manifest 
prejudice  to  my  cause  will  render  their  judgment  of  less  authority  against 
me.  Yet  if  a  poem  have  genius,  it  will  force  its  own  reception  in  the  world ; 
for  there  is  a  sweetness  in  good  verse  which  tickles  even  while  it  hurts;  and 
no  man  can  be  heartily  angry  with  him  who  pleases  him  against  his  will. 
The  commendation  of  adversaries  is  the  greatest  triumph  of  a  writer,  be- 
cause it  never  comes  unless  extorted.  But  I  can  be  satisfied  on  more  easy 
terms :  if  I  happen  to  please  the  more  moderate  sort,  I  shall  be  sure  of  an, 
honest  party,  and  in  all  probability  of  the  best  judges  ;  for  the  least  con- 
cerned are  probably  the  least  corrupt.  And  I  confess  I  have  laid  in  for 
those,  by  rebating  the  satire  (where  justice  would  allow  it)  from  carrying 
too  sharp  an  edge.  They  who  can  criticise  so  weakly  as  to  imagine  I  have 
done  my  worst,  may  be  convinced,  at  their  own  cost,  that  I  can  write 
severely  with  more  ease  than  I  can  gently.  I  have  but  laughed  at  some 


334  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

men's  follies,  where  I  could  have  declaimed  against  their  vices  ;  and  other 
men's  virtues  I  have  commended  as  freely  as  I  have  taxed  their  crimes. 
.  .  .  The  violent  on  both  sides  will  condemn  the  character  of  Absalom, 
as  either  too  favourably  or  too  hardly  drawn  :  but  they  are  not  the  violent 
whom  I  desire  to  please.  The  fault,  on  the  other  hand,  is  to  extenuate, 
palliate,  and  indulge  ;  and,  to  confess  freely,  I  have  endeavoured  to  commit 
it.  Besides  the  respect  which  I  owe  his  birth,  I  have  a  greater  for  his  heroic 
virtues ;  and  David  himself  could  not  be  more  tender  of  the  young  man's 
life  than  I  would  be  of  his  reputation.  But  since  the  most  excellent  natures 
are  always  the  most  easy,  and,  as  being  such,  are  the  soonest  perverted  by  ill 
counsels,  especially  when  baited  with  fame  and  glory,  it  is  no  more  a  wonder 
that  he  withstood  not  the  temptations  of  Achitophel,  than  it  was  for  Adam 
not  to  have  resisted  the  two  devils,  the  serpent  and  the  woman.  The  con- 
clusion of  the  story  I  purposely  forbore  to  prosecute,  because  I  could  nor, 
obtain  from  myself  to  show  Absalom  unfortunate.  The  frame  of  it  was  cut 
out  but  for  a  picture  to  the  waist,  and  if  the  draught  be  so  fnr  true,  it  is  as 
much  as  I  designed. 

"Were  I  the  inventor,  who  am  only  the  historian,  I  should  certainly 
conclude  the  piece  with  the  reconcilement  of  Absalom  to  David  ;  and  who 
knows  but  this  may  come  to  pass  ;  things  were  not  brought  to  an  extremity 
where  I  left  the  story ;  there  seems  yet  to  be  room  left  for  a  composure,  here- 
after there  may  be  only  for  pity.  I  have  not  so  much  as  au  uncharitable 
wish  against  Achitophel,  but  am  content  to  be  accused  of  a  good-natured 
error,  and  to  hope,  with  Origen,  that  the  devil  himself  may  at  last  be  saved ; 
for  which  reason,  in  this  poem,  he  is  neither  brought  to  set  his  house  in 
order,  nor  to  dispose  of  his  person  afterwards  as  he  in  wisdom  shall  think 
fit" 

Dryden  had  no  idea  of  observing  paragraph  law  ;  his  genius  was 
the  reverse  of  methodical.  He  rambles  on,  making  a  point  here 
and  a  point  there,  and  dashing  heartily  away  from  his  immediate 
subject  whenever  he  sees  an  opening  for  his  vigorous  wit.  His 
prose  has  something  of  the  irregular  zigzag  lightning  vigour  and 
splendour  of  his  verse.  Any  one  reading  his  prose  fragments 
for  the  strokes  of  comprehensive  terseness,  brilliant  epigram,  and 
happy  aptness  of  expression,  should  be  on  their  guard  against  the 
infection  of  his  negligent  manner ;  none  should  take  it  for  granted 
that  their  genius  is,  like  his,  sufficient  to  hide  any  number  of 
irregularities. 

The  following  remarks  on  Laughter,  from  his  '  Parallel  between 
Poetry  and  Painting/  prefixed  to  the  translation  of  Du  Fresnoy, 
exemplify  his  rather  incoherent  agglomeration  of  vigorous  sen- 
tences : — 

"Laughter  is  indeed  the  propriety  of  a  man,  but  just  enough  to  distin- 
guish him  from  his  elder  brother  with  four  legs.  It  is  a  kind  of  bastard 
pleasure  too,  taken  in  at  the  eyes  of  the  vulgar  gazers,  and  at  the  ears  of  the 
beastly  audience.  Church  painters  use  it  to  divert  the  honest  countryman 
at  public  prayers,  and  keep  his  eyes  open  at  a  heavy  sermon ;  and  farce 
scribblers  make  use  of  the  same  noble  invention,  to  entertain  citizens, 
country-gentlemen,  and  Covent  Garden  fops.  If  they  are  merry  all  goes 
well  on  the  poet's  side.  The  better  sort  go  thither  too,  but  in  despair  ot 
Beuse  and  the  just  images  of  nature,  which  are  the  adequate  pleasures  of  the 


JOHN   DRYDEN.  335 

rutnd  ;  but  the  author  can  give  the  stage  no  better  than  what  wns  given  him 
by  nature  ;  and  the  actors  must  represent  such  things  as  they  are  capable  to 
pi-rlbnn,  and  by  which  both  they  and  the  scribbler  may  get  their  living. 
After  all,  it  is  a  good  thing  to  laugh  at  any  rate  ;  and  if  a  straw  can  tickle 
a  man,  it  is  an  instrument  of  happiness.  Beasts  can  weep  when  they  suffer, 
but  they  cannot  latigh." 

His  remarks  on  Invention  are  more  to  the  purpose : — 

"The  principal  parts  of  painting  and  poetry  next  follow.  Invention  is 
the  first  part,  and  absolutely  necessary  to  them  both  ;  yet  no  rule  ever  \va> 
or  ever  can  lie  given,  how  to  compass  it.  A  happy  genius  is  the  gift  of 
nature  :  it  depends  on  the  influence  of  the  stars,  say  the  astrologers  ;  on  the 
organs  of  the  body,  say  the  naturalists  ;  it  is  the  particular  gift  of  heaven, 
say  the  divines,  both  Christians  and  heathens.  How  to  improve  it,  many 
books  can  teach  us  ;  how  to  obtain  it,  none  ;  that  nothing  can  be  done  with- 
out it,  all  agree — 

TV  nihU  invita  dices  faciesve  Minerva. 

Without  invention,  a  painter  is  but  a  copier,  and  a  poet  but  a  plagiary  of 
others.  Both  are  allowed  sometimes  to  copy,  and  translate  ;  but  as  our 
author  tells  you,  that  is  not  the  best  part  of  their  reputation.  'Imitators 
are  but  a  servile  kind  of  cattle,'  says  the  poet ;  or  at  best,  the  keepers  of 
cattle  for  other  men  :  they  have  nothing  which  is  properly  their  own  :  that 
is  a  sufficient  mortification  for  me,  while  I  am  translating  Virgil.  But  to 
copy  the  best  author,  is  a  kind  of  praise,  if  I  perform  it  as  I  ought ;  as  a 
copy  after  Rafiaelle  is  more  to  be  commended  than  an  original  of  any  indif- 
ferent painter." 

And  yet,  on  principle,  he  was  opposed  to  unnecessary  digressions 
on  the  larger  scale : — 

"As  in  the  composition  of  a  picture  the  painter  is  to  take  care  that 
nothing  enter  into  it  which  is  not  proper  or  convenient  to  the  subject,  so 
likewise  is  the  poet'to  reject  all  incidents  which  are  foreign  to  his  poem  and 
are  naturally  no  parts  of  it ;  they  are  wens  and  other  excrescences,  which 
belong  not  to  the  body,  but  deform  it.  No  person,  no  incident  in  the  piece 
or  in  the  play,  but  must  be  of  use  to  carry  on  the  main  design.  All  things 
else  are  like  six  fingers  to  the  hand,  when  nature,  which  is  superfluous  in 
nothing,  can  do  her  work  with  five.  A  painter  must  reject  all  trifling  orna- 
ments, so  must  a  poet  refuse  all  tedious  and  unnecessary  descriptions.  A 
role  which  is  too  heavy  is  less  an  ornament  than  a  burthen. " 

We  might  expect  to  find  the  prose  diction  of  a  poet  highly 
coloured,  and  profusely  embellished  with  imagery.  Dryden's  is 
the  reverse  of  this — familiar,  clear,  vigorous,  and  full  of  epigram- 
matic point  "  I  have  endeavoured,"  he  says,  "  to  write  English 
as  near  as  I  could  distinguish  it  from  the  tongue  of  pedants  and 
that  of  affected  travellers."  He  expressly  apologises  for  the 
"  poetical  expressions "  in  his  translation  of  Du  Fresnoy ;  he 
"  dares  not  promise  that  some  of  them  are  not  fustian,  or  at  least 
highly  metaphorical,"  but  the  fault  lay  with  the  original. 

There  is  little  geniality  in  his  style ;  he  knew  as  well  as  any- 
body where  his  power  lay,  and  he  said  of  himself  that  "  he  could 
write  severely  with  more  ease  than  he  could  write  gently."  When 


336  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

he  girds  on  his  sword  for  a  sarcastic  onslaught,  he  goes  to  work 
with  all  his  heart.  In  the  controversy  with  Stillingfleet,  his  in- 
tense feeling  sometimes  betrays  him  into  bare  unadorned  abuse ; 
he  calls  his  adversary,  by  comparison  with  "  the  meekness,  devo- 
tion, and  sincerity"  of  the  pious  lady's  declaration,  "disingenuous, 
foul-mouthed,  and  shuffling."  But  this  is  a  passage  of  exceptional 
heat ;  most  of  the  sarcasm  is  clothed  in  fresh  and  splendid  lan- 
guage, and  takes  the  form  of  rough  but  brilliant  wit,  throwing  his 
tamer  rival  into  the  shade  :  indeed,  had  his  cause  not  been  so  hope- 
lessly unpopular,  the  attack  would  have  been  overwhelming. 


OTHER   WRITERS. 

THEOLOGY. 

The  most  eminent  divine  in  the  early  part  of  this  period  was 
Isaac  Barrow  (1630-1677),  a  man  of  extremely  fertile  and  versatile 
talents.  He  was  the  son  of  a  linen-draper  in  London.  In  1649  he 
was  elected  a  Fellow  of  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  and  for  some 
time  thereafter  studied  medicine.  In  1652  he  was  a  candidate  for 
the  Greek  Professorship,  but  was  disappointed.  He  then  spent 
some  years  in  travelling  along  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean. 
In  1660  he  again  tried  for  the  same  post,  and  was  successful.  He 
had  been  but  two  years  Professor  of  Greek  when  he  discovered 
his  preference  for  mathematics  by  accepting  the  Professorship 
of  Geometry  in  Gresham  College.  In  1663  he  was  apnoii.^cd 
Lucasian  Professor  of  Mathematics  in  Cambridge.  In  1669, 
having  not  yet  found  his  life-work,  he  vacated  his  professorship 
in  favour  of  his  pupil  Isaac  Newton,  and  thereafter  devoted 
himself  exclusively  to  divinity.  In  1670  he  was  made  D.D.  by 
royal  mandate,  receiving  at  the  time  a  high  compliment  from  the 
lips  of  the  King.  In  1672  he  was  nominated  to  the  Mastership  of 
Trinity.  He  published  several  mathematical  works  in  Latin. 
His  English  writings  are  all  theological,  consisting  of  seventy- 
seven  Sermons ;  Expositions  of  the  Apostles'  Creed,  The  Lord's 
Prayer,  The  Decalogue,  &c. ;  a  '  Treatise  on  the  Pope's  Suprem- 
acy;' and  a  'Discourse  concerning  the  Unity  of  the  Church.' 
"  He  was  in  person  of  the  lesser  size,  and  lean ;  of  extraordinary 
strength,  of  a  fair  and  calm  complexion,  a  thin  skin,  very  sensible 
of  the  cold  ;  his  eyes  grey,  clear,  and  somewhat  short-sighted ;  his 
hair  of  a  light  auburn,  very  fine  and  curling."  He  was  abstracted 
in  his  manner,  and  of  slovenly  habits.  Anecdotes  are  told  of  his 
personal  courage  and  presence  of  mind.  He  was  a  great  smoker, 
and  an  immoderate  eater  of  fruit.  He  died  of  fever,  to  which  he 
was  subject.  The  most  striking  things  in  his  sermons  are  the 
extraordinary  copiousness  and  vigour  of  the  language,  and  the  ex- 


THEOLOGY.  337 

haustiveness  and  subtlety  of  the  thought  He  is  a  perfect  mine 
of  varied  and  vigorous  expression.  His  sentences  are  thrown  up 
with  a  rough  careless  vigour  ;  an  extreme  antithesis  to  the  polished 
flow  of  language  and  ideas  in  Addison.  In  his  love  of  scrupulous 
definitions  and  qualifications  we  discover  the  mathematician  ;  he 
divides  and  subdivides  with  Baconian  minuteness,  and  in  drawing 
parallels  adjusts  the  compared  particulars  with  acute  exactness. 

The  simple  and  felicitous  diction  of  John  Tillotson,  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury  (1630-1694),  was  praised  by  Dryden  and  by  Addison, 
and  long  held  up  as  a  model.1  Born  in  Yorkshire,  of  Puritan 
parents,  he  was  educated  at  Cambridge,  submitted  to  the  Act  of 
Uniformity  in  1662,  and  entered  the  Church.  Going  to  London 
in  1663,  his  preaching  soon  drew  attention,  and  he  was  rapidly 
promoted.  At  the  Revolution  he  was  made  Dean  of  St  Paul's, 
and  in  1691  was  raised  to  the  supreme  height  of  ecclesiastical  dig- 
nity. He  was  a  man  of  great  moderation  and  good  sense,  without 
excitability  or  enthusiasm,  "  loving  neither  tne  ceremony  nor  the 
trouble  of  a  great  place."  Though  he  received  preferment  in  the 
reign  of  Charles,  he  was  not  an  extravagant  royalist :  his  wife  was 
the  niece  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  and  daughter-in-law  of  Bishop  Wil- 
kins.  Ready  to  serve  his  friends,  he  was  literary  executor  to 
Wilkins  and  to  Barrow,  gave  an  opinion  on  Burnet's  '  History  of 
the  Reformation '  before  it  was  published,  and  edited  the  '  Dis- 
courses'  of  Dr  Hezekiah  Burton.  A  good,  easy,  clear-headed 
man,  with  not  a  little  of  the  character  of  Paley.  The  merits  of 
his  style  are  simplicity,  and  a  happy  fluency  in  the  choice  and 
combination  of  words.  He  probably  had  no  small  influence  in 
forming  the  style  of  Addison.  The  defects  are  considerable.  In 
his  easy  way  he  lingers  upon  an  idea,  and  gives  two  or  three 
expressions  where  one  would  serve  the  purpose ;  passing  on,  he 
rambles  back  again,  and  presents  the  idea  in  several  other  differ- 
ent aspects.  The  result  is  an  enfeebling  tautology  and  want  of 
method.  Taken  individually,  the  expressions  are  admirably  easy 
and  felicitous  ;  but  there  are  too  many  of  them,  and  they  are  ill 
arranged. 

Edward  Stillingfleet  (1635-1699),  made  Bishop  of  Worcester  in 
1689,  was  much  before  the  public  as  a  controversialist  during  this 
period.  He  fought  against  Atheists,  Unitarians,  Papists,  and  Dis- 
senters, and  rendered  distinguished  service  to  his  causa  His  best- 
known  engagements  were  with  Dryden  and  Locke.  Against  Dry- 
den,  though  far  inferior  in  style,  he  had  the  best  of  the  argument , 

1  Dryden  is  said  to  have  "  owned  with  pleasure  that  if  he  had  sny  talent  for 
English  prose  it  was  owing  to  his  having  often  read  the  writings  of  Archbishop 
Tillotson."  This  is  but  a  random  compliment;  Dryden  showed  his  talent  for 
English  prose  before  Tillotson  had  published  a  line,  and  long  before  he  became 
famous. 


338  FROM    1670  TO    1700. 

but  in  the  encounter  with  Locke  he  sustained  a  defeat  so  signal  and 
humiliating  that  it  was  said  to  have  hastened  his  death.  He  wrote 
with  great  vigour,  but  his  expressions  are  neither  original  nor  fe- 
licitous. To  a  modern  reader  his  manner  seems  too  arrogant  and 
personal  to  be  persuasive.  Although  Clarendon  professes  himself 
"  exceedingly  delighted  with  the  softness,  gentleness,  and  civility 
of  his  language,"  this  word-praise  is  not  borne  out  by  facts  ;  there 
is  no  evidence  that  he  had  Tillotson's  power  of  bringing  over 
opponents. 

William  Sherlock  (1641-1707),  who  succeeded  Tillotson  as  Dean 
of  St  Paul's,  was  another  champion  of  the  Church  against  dissent 
and  infidelity,  and  wrote  a  'Vindication  of  the  Trinity'  in  1691 ; 
but  he  is  now  known  only  by  his  devotional  works.  His  '  Dis- 
course concerning  Death'  is  a  standing  article  in  second-hand 
book-stalls.  This  continued  popularity  is  due  more  to  the  matter 
than  to  the  manner.  His  son  Thomas  was  more  distinguished  than 
himself. 

Sherlock's  '  Vindication '  was  attacked  with  great  wit  and  fury 
by  a  man  far  his  superior  in  literary  genius,  Robert  South  (1633- 
1716).  South,  a  brilliant  Oxonian  scholar,  the  son  of  a  London 
merchant,  was  an  ultra-royalist,  appointed  at  the  Restoration  Pub- 
lic Orator  of  his  University,  and  chaplain  to  the  Earl  of  Clarendon. 
He  accompanied  Lawrence  Hyde  to  Poland  in  1676.  On  his  re- 
turn he  was  presented  to  the  rectory  of  Islip,  and,  having  some 
private  fortune,  steadily  declined  further  preferment.  He  haa 
been  called  the  last  of  the  great  English  divines  of  the  century. 
A  quick  and  powerful  intellect,  solid  erudition,  a  superlative  com- 
mand of  homely  racy  English,  and  wit  of  unsurpassed  brilliancy, 
make  a  combination  that,  in  a  literary  point  of  view,  places  the 
possessor  at  least  on  a  level  with  Taylor  and  Barrow.  Doubtless 
his  fame  would  have  been  equal  to  his  powers  had  he  not  mistaken 
his  vocation.  He  shows  little  religious  earnestness,  and  without 
that,  devotional,  and  even  controversial,  religious  works  can  hardly 
pretend  to  the  first  rank.  He  was  an  earnest  Churchman,  but  not 
an  earnest  Christian.  Against  sectaries  his  abuse  was  hearty  and 
hot — "  villanous  arts,"  "  venomous  gibberish,"  "  treacherous  cant," 
"  a  pack  of  designing  hypocrites,"  are  samples  of  his  phrases. 
Satirical  wit  is  his  distinguishing  quality.  Even  his  sermons  are 
brilliantly  lighted  up  with  flashes  of  ingenious  mockery;  he  was 
always  glad  to  have  a  victim. 

Thomas  Sprat,  D.D.  (1636-1713),  Fellow  of  Wadham,  Bishop  of 
Rochester,  friend  and  biographer  of  Cowley.  Besides  his  '  Life  of 
Cowley,'  he  wrote  a  '  History  of  the  Royal  Society,'  of  which  he 
was  a  member,  as  well  as  sermons  and  political  tracts.  He  is 
praised  by  Macaulay  as  "  a  great  master  of  our  language,  and  pos- 
sessed at  once  of  the  eloquence  of  the  orator,  of  the  controversialist, 


THEOLOGY.  339 

and  of  the  historian."  He  also  received  a  high  tribute  from  John- 
son. There  is  indeed  a  certain  flow  and  rotund  finish  about  his 
diction.  Some  of  his  sentences  would  pass  for  Johnson's.  Had 
the  matter  been  more  substantial,  he  might  have  taken  a  higher 
place  in  our  literature ;  but  he  was  a  good  genial  fellow,  rather 
fond  of  the  bottle,  and  his  lubricated  eloquence  perished  with 
him. 

Thomas  Burnet  (1635-1715),  Master  of  the  Charter -house,  is 
known  in  literature  by  his  '  Sacred  Theory  of  the  Earth '  (pub.  in 
Latin  1680,  in  English  1691).  It  is  the  outcome  of  a  poetic  mind 
excited  by  the  gathering  interest  in  physical  science.  The  theory 
is  merely  a  framework  for  extravagant  sublimities  of  description. 
He  represents  the  antediluvian  globe  as  disposed  in  regular  con- 
centric belts,  the  heavy  solid  parts  in  the  centre,  then  the  liquid, 
then  on  the  top  of  the  liquid  a  floating  crust  of  solidified  oily  mat- 
ter, "even  and  uniform  all  over,"  without  rocks  or  mountains, 
"wrinkle,  scar,  or  fracture."  On  this  smooth  surface,  fresh,  fruit- 
ful, overhung  by  a  calm  and  serene  atmosphere,  men  lived  till  the 
Flood ;  that  calamity  was  caused  by  the  generation  of  steam  in  the 
subterraneous  water  and  the  rupture  of  the  crust,  when  "  the  whole 
fabric  broke,"  and  tumbled  in  fragments  into  the  abyss.  The 
accounts  of  the  Flood  and  of  the  final  conflagration  of  the  existing 
earth  are  given  in  language  worthy  of  such  bold  and  spacious  con- 
ceptions. 

Of  little  importance  in  literature,  but  of  considerable  importance 
in  the  history  of  opinion,  are  the  two  chief  literary  defenders  of 
the  Quaker  faith,  William  Penn  (1644-1718),  and  Robert  Barclay 
(1648-1690),  both  men  of  good  position  by  birth.  Penn,  the  son  of 
an  admiral,  imbibed  the  proscribed  views  at  Oxford,  and  was  ex- 
pelled the  University.  A  course  of  travel  on  the  Continent  made 
him  a  fine  gentleman  again ;  the  Plague  reconverted  him ;  a  trip 
to  Ireland  restored  him  to  fashionable  circles ;  a  sermon  from  an 
old  master  converted  him  a  third  time.  This  last  conversion  was 
in  1668  :  from  that  date  he  remained  Quaker  for  life.  In  1669  he 
was  imprisoned  for  eight  months.  For  some  years  thereafter  his 
life  was  prosperous.  He  was  reconciled  to  his  father,  who  left  him 
a  good  estate,  and  some  claims  on  the  Government,  in  liquidation 
of  which  he  received  a  grant  of  Pennsylvania  in  America.  In  the 
later  years  of  Charles  and  under  James  he  was  a  great  favourite  at 
Court :  his  conduct  there  is  assailed  by  Macaulay  and  warmly  de- 
fended by  Paget  and  others.  The  remaining  thirty  years  of  his 
life  were  spent  in  private,  not  a  little  imbittered  by  personal  griefs 
and  losses. — Barclay  was  a  Scotsman,  of  the  family  of  Barclay  of 
Ury.  He  several  times  suffered  imprisonment  His  works  are, 
'Truth  Cleared  of  Calumnies,'  1670;  and  'An  Apology  for  the 
People  called  in  scorn  Quakers.'  Neither  Penn  nor  Barclay  has 


340  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

any  special  grace  or  vigour  of  style.     Penn  is  lively  and  pointed, 
Barclay  grave  and  argumentative. 

Thomas  Ellwood  (1639-1713),  another  of  the  Quakers,  a  meek, 
industrious  man,  of  a  feeble  constitution,  is  interesting,  not  from 
his  style,  but  from  his  intercourse  with  Milton.  He  was  one  of 
the  blind  poet's  readers.  He  wrote  an  autobiography,  and  contro- 
versial and  devotional  treatises. 

PHILOSOPHY. 

John  Locke  (1632-1704).  The  famous  author  of  the  « Essay  on 
the  Human  Understanding'  (pub.  1690)  was  the  son  of  a  small 
proprietor  in  the  west  of  England.  He  took  the  degree  of  B.A.  at 
Oxford  in  1655,  and  was  elected  a  student  of  Christ  Church.  His 
chief  studies  were  medicine  and  physical  science,  on  which  subjects 
he  became  an  authority.  His  approbation  of  Sydenham's  theory 
of  acute  diseases  was  considered  worth  boasting  of  by  this  "  father 
of  English  medicine  " ;  and  he  signified  a  desire  to  succeed,  in  the 
event  of  a  vacancy,  to  the  Physic  Professorship  at  Gresham  Col- 
lege. His  chief  patron  was  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury.  He  divided 
his  time  between  Oxford  and  London,  living  in  the  most  cultivated 
society.  He  spent  four  years  in  France.  When  Shaftesbury's 
fortunes  declined,  Locke  also  fell  into  difficulties  with  the  Govern- 
ment, and  had  to  take  refuge  in  Holland.  While  there  he  wrote 
in  Latin  his  famous  'Letter  on  Toleration.'  After  the  Revolution, 
having  recommended  himself  by  his  liberal  principles,  he  was  re- 
warded with  the  Commissionership  of  Stamps ;  and  also  held  for  five 
years  a  more  lucrative  office  as  one  of  the  Commissioners  of  Trade. 
His  '  Two  Treatises  on  Government,'  opposing  the  divine  right  of 
kings,  and  advancing  the  ideas  of  a  social  compact  and  of  the 
natural  rights  of  man,  appeared  in  1690.  In  the  same  year  were 
published  the  Essay,  and  the  'Treatise  on  Education.'  The  'Con- 
duct of  the  Understanding '  was  not  published  till  after  his  death. 
Locke's  health  was  never  robust ;  an  elder  brother  died  young  of 
consumption,  and  he  himself,  in  spite  of  the  utmost  care,  died  of  a 
decline.  He  was  an  agreeable,  well-bred  man,  a  sprightly  talker, 
and  fond  of  company  chiefly  for  the  pleasures  of  talking.  At  col- 
lege he  associated  with  the  lively  and  agreeable  in  preference  to 
the  scholarly.  He  was  frugal,  and  regular  in  his  habits.  His 
sagacity  and  powers  of  expression  were  very  great.  All  the  works 
above  mentioned  drew  immediate  attention,  and  are  still  read  by 
everybody  professing  an  acquaintance  with  their  topics.  He  is 
one  of  the  most  simple  of  philosophical  writers.  Authorities  com- 
plain that  this  popular  simplicity  is  bought  at  the  expense  of  ex- 
actness ;  that  his  use  of  terms  is  vacillating ;  and  that  his  notions 
are  ill  defined. 


HISTORY.  34 1 

The  learned  Ralph  Cndworth  (1617-1688),  a  student  of  Cam- 
bridge, and  Professor  of  Hebrew  there  from  1645  to  1675,  pub- 
lished in  1678  his  'Intellectual  System  of  the  Universe.'  He 
seems  to  have  been  a  shy,  retiring  man,  with  something  of  Hooker's 
disposition ;  like  Hooker,  also,  an  industrious  and  profound  scholar. 
He  was  not  of  a  controversial  turn,  but  was  pressed  by  his  friends 
to  take  the  field  against  Hobbes,  atheism,  and  every  form  of 
heterodoxy.  He  stated  the  opinions  of  his  opponents  at  such 
length  and  with  such  candour  that  his  sincerity  was  suspected ; 
and  he  was  so  alarmed  at  the  outcry  raised  by  his  honourable  and 
ingenious  fashion  of  polemic,  that  he  refrained  from  further  publi- 
cation. His  '  Treatise  of  Eternal  and  Immutable  Morality '  was 
not  published  till  1731. 

Another  opponent  of  Hobbes  was  Richard  Cumberland  (1632- 
1718),  Bishop  of  Peterborough,  author  of  a  work  on  the  '  Laws  of 
Nature.'  His  doctrines  have  an  independent  place  in  the  history 
of  philosophy ;  but  as  he  wrote  in  Latin,  he  has  but  a  quasi-legiti- 
mate standing  in  the  history  of  English  literature. 

HISTORY. 

Gilbert  Bnrnet  (1643-1715),  Bishop  of  Salisbury,  an  active  poli- 
tician, and  author  of  several  religious  and  other  works  known  only 
to  antiquarians,  received  the  thanks  of  Parliament  for  his  '  History 
of  the  Reformation'  in  1676,  and  earned  a  durable  fame  by  his 
posthumous  '  History  of  my  own  Times,  from  the  restoration  of 
Charles  II.  to  the  conclusion  of  the  Treaty  of  Peace  at  Utrecht,  in 
the  Reign  of  Queen  Anne.'  He  belonged  to  an  ancient  Aberdeen- 
shire  family,  and  was  educated  at  Mariscbal  College,  Aberdeen. 
At  the  age  of  twenty-six  (1669)  he  was  made  Professor  of  Divinity 
in  Glasgow,  and  before  he  was  thirty  he  was  twice  offered  a  Scot- 
tish bishopric.  About  1673  he  resigned  his  professorial  chair  and 
went  to  London,  where  his  powers  as  a  preacher,  no  less  than  as  a 
sagacious  observer  of  politics,  soon  made  him  conspicuous.  During 
the  reign  of  James,  he  thought  it  prudent  to  retire  to  the  Con- 
tinent, and  received  a  flattering  invitation  to  the  Hague.  He 
came  back  with  the  Prince  of  Orange,  and  in  1689  was  appointed 
Bishop  of  Sarum.  He  was  a  shrewd,  sagacious  Scotchman,  and 
throughout  life  acted  with  a  prudence  that  was  disturbed  neither 
by  impetuosity  nor  by  strong  feeling.  Yet  he  displayed  at  times 
a  steady  courageous  sincerity  where  many  of  the  sneerers  at  his 
prudence  would  have  kept  discreetly  in  the  background.  He  had 
a  peculiar  power  of  reading  character,  and  of  insinuating  himself 
into  the  confidence  of  the  great.  A  tall,  well-built,  fine-looking 
man,  with  extraordinary  powers  of  extempore  address,  he  was  one 
of  the  most  popular  preachers  of  the  metropolis :  he  "was  often," 


342  FEOM  1670  TO  1700. 

says  Macaulay,  "  interrupted  by  the  doep  hum  of  his  audience ; 
and  when,  after  preaching  out  the  hour-glass,  he  held  it  up  in  hia 
hand,  the  congregation  clamorously  encouraged  him  to  go  on  til' 
the  sand  had  run  off  once  more."  Natural  temper  and  varied 
education  concurred  to  make  his  views  anti-despotic ;  he  was  a 
steady  supporter  of  the  Revolution;  by  his  considerate  behaviour 
he  made  himself  extremely  popular  among  the  clergy  of  his  diocese. 
We  have  evidence  that  he  was  careful  about  his  written  style,  pur- 
posely aiming  at  "  aptness  of  words  and  justness  of  figures,"  and 
striving  to  avoid  "  the  fulsome  pedantry  under  which  the  English 
language  laboured  long  ago,  the  trifling  way  of  dark  and  unin- 
telligible wit  that  came  after  that,  the  coarse  extravagance  of 
canting  that  succeeded  this,  and  the  sublime  pitch  of  a  strong  but 
false  rhetoric,  which  had  much  corrupted  not  only  the  stage  but 
even  the  pulpit,  but  was  almost  worn  out"  when  he  wrote.1  He 
may  be  said  to  have  realised  this  ideal ;  his  words  are  generally 
well  chosen,  his  illustrations  appropriate,  and  his  diction  copious 
without  being  in  any  way  extravagant ;  but  his  dry  correctness  is 
not  made  up  for  by  fluent  melody  or  by  happy  originality  of  com- 
bination. The  great  charms  of  his  '  History  of  my  own  Times '  lie 
in  the  gossip  from  behind  the  scenes,  and  the  skilful  delineation 
of  character.  He  had  something  of  Bos  well's  faculty  for  noting 
characteristic  incidents,  besides  the  power  of  showing  them  briefly 
in  a  connected  portraiture.  None  of  our  historians  surpass,  if  any 
equal  him,  in  this  respect  When  we  compare  his  vivid  delinea- 
tions of  the  men  of  the  Revolution  with  Macaulay's  jumble  of 
characteristic  traits  and  high-flown  moral  commonplaces,  we  at 
once  recognise  the  hand  of  a  natural  master  of  the  art. 

Along  with  Burnet  may  be  mentioned  Sir  George  Mackenzie 
(1636-1691),  Lord  Advocate  under  Charles  II.  and  James  II.,  author 
of  '  Memoirs  of  the  Affairs  of  Scotland,  from  the  Restoration  of 
Charles  II.,'  not  printed  till  1821.  Mackenzie  was  familiar  with 
Dryden  and  the  literary  society  of  the  time,  and  wrote  several 
lively  miscellaneous  essays  :  "  The  Virtuoso  or  Stoic,"  "  Moral  Gal- 
lantry," "  The  Moral  History  of  Frugality,"  &c.  A  composition  in 
praise  of  Solitude  led  to  a  friendly  passage  of  arms  with  John 
Evelyn,  who  entered  the  lists  in  defence  of  active  life. 

Two  famous  DIARISTS  are  usually  reckoned  in  this  generation — 
Samuel  Pepys  (1632-1703)  and  John  Evelyn  (1620-1706).  Pepys 
was  Secretary  to  the  Admiralty  in  the  reigns  of  Charles  II.  and 
James  IL  His  Diary,  which  extends  from  1660  to  1669,  was 
written  in  shorthand,  and  was  deciphered  by  Lord  Braybrooke  in 
1825.  This  delightful  book  of  gossip  is  one  of  the  most  interest- 
ing memorials  of  the  domestic  life  of  the  time.  Evelyn's  Diary  is 
1  Preface  to  hia  translation  of  More's  '  Utopia,'  1684. 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  343 

the  work  of  a  more  accomplished  man  (though  a  less  interesting 
and  instructive  gossip),  and  extends  through  a  longer  period.  It 
is,  indeed,  an  autobiography  extending  from  1620  to  1706.  From 
1641  he  was  in  the  habit  of  setting  down  with  considerable  detail 
everything  that  interested  him.  Only  extracts  of  so  voluminous 
a  work  have  been  published.  Evelyn  is  now  known  chiefly  by  his 
Diary.  In  his  own  day  he  was  called  "Sylva"  Evelyn,  from  a 
'  Discourse  on  Forest-Trees,  and  the  Propagation  of  Timber  in  his 
Majesty's  Dominions,'  published  in  1664.  He  was  a  man  of  inde- 
pendent fortune,  and  held  public  employment  under  Charles  and 
James. 

Among  the  chief  ANTIQUARIES  of  the  period  were  Anthony  a 
Wood  (1632-1695),  the  great  authority  on  the  antiquities  of  Oxford 
(Athence  Oxanienses,  1691),  and  John  Aubrey  (1626-1700),  a  fellow- 
labourer  with  Dugdale  and  Wood,  and  an  authority  on  popular 
superstitions.  Thomas  Rymer  (1638-1714),  compiler  of  Carlyle's 
favourite  butt,  Rymer's  l  Fcedera,'  also  flourished  in  this  period. 
He  began  life  as  a  tragic  poet  and  dramatic  critic.  Appointed 
historiographer-royal  in  1692,  he  was  employed  to  prepare  a 
collection  of  the  liocuments  of  our  public  transactions  with  foreign 
powers.  He  lived  to  publish  seventeen  folio  volumes  of  the  series, 
the  first  appearing  in  1703. 


MISCELLANEOUa 

Sir  Roger  L'Estrange  (1616-1704),  was  the  leading  newspaper 
writer  throughout  the  reigns  of  Charles  and  James.  An  enterpris- 
ing royalist  soldier,  who  had  suffered  not  a  little  in  the  cause,  he 
was  appointed  licenser  or  censor  of  the  press  in  1663,  and  at  the 
same  time  received  a  monopoly  of  public  intelligence  in  favour  of 
his  own  newspaper,  '  The  Public  Intelligencer.'  He  worked  hard 
to  make  his  paper  a  thorough  repertory  of  news,  and  to  extend  its 
circulation ;  and  it  was  a  great  discouragement  to  the  growth  of 
newspapers  when  in  1665  his  monopoly  and  his  censorship  were 
taken  from  him  and  given  to  a  duller  rival  in  Court  favour.  The 
disgrace  did  not  extinguish  his  loyalty.  He  continued  to  support 
the  Court  with  various  effusions;  and  in  his  '  Qbservator,'  which 
appeared  in  1681,  rendered  valuable  service  in  defending  the  royal 
family  from  the  charge  of  Popery.  He  excelled  in  the  coarse 
derision  and  invective — the  rough  give-and-take  of  the  time  ;  so 
much  so,  that  he  has  been,  absurdly  enough,  accused  of  corrupting 
the  Knglish  language.  He  earned  the  hatred  of  lovers  of  freedom 
by  his  opposition  to  the  emancipation  of  the  press  (which  was 
accomplished  in  1604),  and  by  his  rude  exercise  of  authority  while 


344  FROM   1670  TO   1700. 

he  was  himself  censor ;  but  these  offences  may  fairly  enough  be 
considered  the  accidents  of  his  time  and  his  position. 

Charles  Blount  (1654-1693),  son  of  Sir  Henry  Blount,  a  Hert- 
fordshire gentleman,  author  of  Travels  and  various  poetical  pieces, 
came  more  than  once  into  collision  with  L' Estrange.  He  rendered 
himself  notorious  by  various  deistical  publications — among  others, 
a  history  of  opinions  concerning  the  soul,  and  an  exposition  of  his 
own  views,  under  the  title  of  '  Religio  Laici.'  A  trick  that  he 
played  on  the  licenser  of  books  in  1693,  led  to  the  abolition  of  all 
restrictions  on  the  freedom  of  the  press.  He  committed  suicide 
because  the  sister  of  his  deceased  wife,  to  whom  he  was  passion- 
ately attached,  would  not  marry  him  without  the  consent  of  the 
Church,  and  that  was  not  to  be  obtained. 

Walter  Charleton  (1619-1707),  physician  to  Charles  II.,  and  a 
friend  of  Hobbes,  besides  several  works  on  Theology,  Natural 
History,  Natural  Philosophy,  Medicine,  and  Antiquities,  wrote 
'  A  Brief  Discourse  concerning  the  Different  Wits  of  Men  '  (1675). 
Traces  of  Hobbes's  materialism  appear  in  the  work.  He  ascribes 
differences  in  character  to  differences  in  the  form,  size,  and  quality 
of  the  brain.  His  style  is  rather  pedantic,  chiefly  from  a  peculiar 
habit  of  beginning  his  sentence  with  the  predicate  adjective 
("Somewhat  slow  they  are" — "Barren  they  are  not,"  &c.);  but 
he  writes  with  vigour,  clearness,  and  wit. 

The  witty,  sagacious,  and  versatile  George  Saville,  Marquis  of 
Halifax  (1630-1695),  in  the  course  of  his  active  public  life  wrote 
some  short  treatises  that  show  him  to  have  been  an  easy  master  of 
the  best  English  of  the  time.  His  '  Character  of  a  Trimmer '  (a 
humorous  defence  of  moderate  courses)  is  the  most  famous  of  these 
productions. 

Robert  Boyle  (1627-1691),  "  the  father  of  chemistry,  and  brother 
to  the  Earl  of  Cork,"  is  the  author  of  six  quarto  volumes  of 
scientific  observations  and  religious  advices  and  meditations.  He 
was  one  of  the  most  active  of  the  original  members  of  the  Royal 
Society.  His  favourite  subjects  were  chemistry  and  pneumatics. 
His  religious  musings  are  very  commonplace  :  it  was  to  get  clear 
of  the  annoyance  of  reading  them  aloud  to  a  lady  admirer  that 
Swift  wrote  his  famous  parody,  'Meditation  on  a  Broomstick.' 
His  style  is  prolix  and  unmethodical 

Sir  Isaac  Newton  (1642-1727),  the  most  distinguished  of  English 
mathematicians,  inventor  of  the  method  of  fluxions,  and  discoverer 
of  gravitation  and  the  dispersion  of  light,  need  only  be  mentioned 
here.  He  was  born  in  Lincolnshire ;  like  Hobbes,  a  premature 
and  sickly  child.  His  mechanical  and  mathematical  powers  wen; 
si  >on  conspicuous.  In  1669  he  succeeded  Barrow  as  Lucasian 
Professor  of  Mathematics  at  Cambridge.  In  recognition  of  his 
services  to  science,  he  was  appointed  Warden  of  the  Mint  in  1695, 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITERS.  345 

and  Master  in  1699.  In  1703  he  was  elected  President  of  the 
Royal  Society,  to  which  he  had  early  been  admitted  as  a  member. 
In  1705  he  received  the  honour  of  knighthood.  His  best-known 
mathematical  work,  the  '  Principia,'  or  Mathematical  Principles  of 
Natural  Philosophy,  published  in  1687,  was  written  in  Latin.  In 
addition  to  his  mathematical  labours,  he  turned  his  ingenuity  to 
thorny  questions  in  Scripture,  writing  '  Observations  on  the  Pro- 
phecies;' the  'Chronology  of  Ancient  Kingdoms.;'  and  'An  His- 
torical Account  of  Two  Notable  Corruptions  of  Scripture ; ' — 
which  works  were  published  after  his  death.  His  style  is  plain 
and  clear.1 

John  Ray  (1628-1705),  the  son  of  a  blacksmith  in  Essex,  was 
the  great  English  naturalist  of  the  century,  and  is  regarded  as 
one  of  the  founders  of  botany.  A  work  published  in  1691,  'The 
Wisdom  of  God,  manifested  in  the  Works  of  the  Creation,'  was 
exceedingly  popular  until  superseded  by  Paley's  '  Natural  The- 
ology.' It  is  written  with  considerable  neatness  and  spirit. 

1  A  vexed  question  in  the  life  of  Newton  is  whether  or  not  his  mind  was 
deranged  about  the  year  1693.  Sir  David  Brewster,  in  his  'Life  of  Newton,' 
inclines  to  think  that  it  was  but  a  temporary  excitement.  In  one  of  his  letters 
Newton  complains  of  not  having  slept  "an  hour  a-night  for  a  fortnight  together, 
and  for  five  days  together  not  a  wink."  About  this  time  he  wrote  some  inco- 
herent letters,  on  which  principally  is  founded  the  story  of  his  madness. 


CHAPTER    YL 


FROM    1700   TO    1730. 

THROUGHOUT  last  century  this  period  was  venerated  as  the  Angus- 
tan  Age  in  English  Literature,  the  idea  being  that  it  had  reached 
a  crowning  pitch  of  refinement  in  the  arts  of  composition,  and  that 
in  this  respect  the  Augustan  Age  was  its  prototype.  The  present 
century  has  not  sanctioned  the  venerable  title :  our  critics  will  not 
allow  that  Pope,  Swift,  and  Addison  are  equal  in  literary  power 
either  to  their  great  predecessors  of  the  age  of  Elizabeth,  or  to 
their  great  successors  of  more  recent  times ;  and  on  that  ground 
refuse  them  the  dignified  appellation  of  Augustan.  We  may  agree 
with  the  criticism  of  this  century  and  yet  leave  the  Queen  Anne 
celebrities  in  possession  of  their  coveted  title.  In  the  quality  of 
careful  finish  the  Queen  Anne  men  were  undoubtedly  as  much 
superior  to  their  predecessors  as  the  Augustan  men  were  to  their 
predecessors.  In  other  and  more  universally  impressive  qualities 
the  Shakspeare  period  and  the  Byron  period  surpass  both  Queen 
Anne  and  Augustus — rising,  if  not  "  above  all  Greek,"  certainly 
"above  all  Roman  fame." 

We  have  here  to  do  only  with  prose ;  and,  in  that  department, 
even  the  doctrine  that  the  Queen  Anne  men  are  superior  to  their 
predecessors  in  elaborate  finish  may  be  assailed  with  plausible,  if 
not  destructive  casuistry.  Defoe  was  probably  as  careless  and 
hurried  in  composition  as  any  author  that  ever  lifted  pen  in  the 
Elizabethan  or  in  any  other  age.  Addison  probably  committed 
more  errors  in  syntax  than  Thomas  Fuller.  Swift  finished  his 
great  compositions  with  extreme  care,  but  he  learned  the  habit  of 
painstaking  from  his  master  Sir  William  Temple.  One  cannot  be 
too  careful  in  making  sweeping  generalisations  about  the  char- 
acteristics of  a  period.  Probably  all  that  can  be  affirmed  with 
safety  about  Queen  Anne  prose  is  that,' taken  as  a  whole,  the  prose 


DANIEL  DEFOE.  347 

written  by  tins  generation  contained  fewer  grammatical  errors,  and 
was,  within  certain  limits,  more  varied  in  expression  than  the  prose 
written  by  the  preceding  generation ;  and  this  can  probably  be 
affirmed  of  any  generation  of  writers  in  the  history  of  our  litera- 
tura  We  are  too  apt  to  attribute  the  characteristics  of  a  leading 
writer  to  his  age ;  because  Addison  wrote  with  refined  wit  and 
elegant  simplicity,  and  had  a  certain  number  of  imitators,  we  are 
not  to  ascribe  these  qualities  to  the  whole  prose  literature  of  the 
reign  of  Queen  Anne. 

DANIEL    DEFOE,    1661-173L 

One  of  the  most  indefatigable  and  productive  of  our  prose 
writers,1  pamphleteer,  journalist,  writer  of  Commercial  Treatises, 
of  Religious  Treatises,  of  History,  and  of  Fiction.  He  is  so  well 
known  as  the  author  of  'Robinson  Crusoe,'  that  many  think  of 
him  in  no  other  capacity;  and  forget,  if  they  ever  hear  of,  the 
extraordinary  number  and  variety  of  his  works.  He  is  reputed 
author  of  250  distinct  publications.  He  was  nearly  sixty  years 
old  when  he  published  his  first  novel;  and  before  that  time  he 
had  written  some  hundred  and  fifty  treatises  on  politics,  religion, 
commerce,  and  what  not. 

He  is  sometimes  represented  as  an  illiterate  London  tradesman 
with  no  education  but  what  he  gave  himself  after  leaving  school. 
His  own  account  is  that  he  was  educated  by  his  father,  a  well-to-do 
butcher  in  St  Giles's,  Cripplegate,  with  a  view  to  the  Dissenter 
ministry,  and  that  he  studied  for  five  years  with  that  express  aim. 
At  whatever  time  or  times  he  had  picked  up  his  knowledge,  he  was 
well  informed,  and  even  accomplished  :  being  (by  his  own  account) 
master  of  five  languages — including  Latin ;  widely  read  in  books 
of  history  and  travel ;  and  acquainted  with  such  science  as  was 
known  in  his  day. 

His  life  was  stirring  and  eventful,  although  comparatively  few 
of  the  incidents  are  known.  His  enemies  taunted  him  with  begin- 
ning business  as  a  hosier.  Tliis  he  denied,  describing  himself  as  a 
trader.  From  other  authority  we  know  that  in  course  of  business 
he  visited  Portugal,  and  perhaps  other  parts  of  the  Continent 
Whatever  his  trade  may  have  been,  he  was  too  volatile  to  stick  to 
it  An  ardent  politician,  he  wrote  in  1683  a  political  pamphlet 
on  the  war  between  the  Turks  and  the  Austrians;  and  in  1685 
rode  out  (at  least  so  he  says)  and  joined  the  western  rising  for 
the  Duke  of  Monmouth.  In  1692  he  had  to  compound  with  his 
creditors.  It  is  a  fair  conjecture  that  about  this  time  he  began  to 

1  He  is  sometimes  called  the  first  author  by  profession ;  but  this  is  hardly 
correct.  Fuller  had  little  to  depend  upon  but  the  sale  of  his  works,  and  Birken- 
head,  Needham,  and  L'Estrange,  lived  by  their  literary  services  to  a  party. 


348  FKOM   1700  TO   1730. 

cherish,  with  or  without  encouragement,  hopes  of  patronage  from 
the  Minister  of  State.  Some  friends  offering  to  settle  him  as  a 
factor  at  Cadiz,  he  preferred  his  prospects  at  home.  Another 
business  speculation  was  unsuccessful :  he  started  a  pantile  work, 
but,  according  to  his  own  account,  it  lost  him  ^3000.  In  1695 
he  was  appointed  accountant  to  the  commissioners  for  managing 
the  duties  on  glass  ;  and  held  that  office  till  the  duty  was  abolished 
in  1699.  In  1701  his  metrical  satire  '  The  True-Born  Englishman  ' 
— an  energetic  defence  of  King  William,  the  Dutch,  and  the  Rev- 
olution— brought  him  into  high  favour  with  the  King.  In  1702 
an  ironical  proposal — '  The  Shortest  Way  with  the  Dissenters ' — 
gave  such  offence  that  he  was  put  in  the  pillory,  fined,  and  im- 
prisoned. During  his  imprisonment  he  collected  and  revised 
twenty-one  of  the  numerous  tracts  that  he  had  written  up  to  that 
date,  and  projected  a  weekly  periodical  called  the  '  Review,'  the 
prototype  of  the  'Tatler'  and  the  'Spectator.'  The  first  number 
of  the  '  Review'  was  published  on  igth  February  1704,  and  it  was 
continued  single-handed  for  eight  years.  In  1704,  through  the 
intervention  of  Harley,  he  was  not  only  released,  but  was  taken 
into  the  confidence  of  Government,  and  employed  on  secret  ser- 
vices. In  1706-7  he  spent  four  months  in  Edinburgh  as  an  agent 
for  promoting  the  Union,  and  his  skilful  advocacy  of  the  commer- 
cial advantages  of  the  measure  is  supposed  to  have  exercised  no 
small  influence  on  the  happy  result  Through  the  changes  of  ad- 
ministration during  the  latter  years  of  Queen  Anne,  he  continued 
in  the  secret  service  of  Government,  all  the  time  writing  period- 
icals and  pamphlets  with  his  characteristic  prolific  industry.  Nor 
did  he  lose  this  profitable  connection  with  the  ruling  powers  on 
the  accession  of  George  I.  and  the  Whigs.  Till  a  discovery  made 
by  Mr  William  Lee  in  1869,  it  was  supposed  that  at  this  date  he 
retired  from  politics,  and  wrote  his  more  elaborate  works :  his 
'Family  Instructor'  (1715),  'Religious  Courtship'  (1722),  'Com- 
plete English  Tradesman'  (1726),  '  Political  History  of  the  Devil' 
(1726);  and  his  novels — the  foundation  of  his  literary  fame — 
'Robinson  Crusoe'  (1719),  'Captain  Singleton'  (1720),  'Duncan 
Campbell'  (1720),  'Moll  Flanders'  (1721),  'Colonel  Jack'  (1721), 
'Journal  of  the  Plague'  (1722),  'Roxana'  (1724),  'Memoirs  of  a 
Cavalier'  (undated).  But  it  seems  that  for  several  years  after 
1715  he  played  a  very  double  game;  being  paid  by  the  Whig 
statesmen  to  insinuate  himself  into  the  staff  of  an  extreme  Jacobite 
paper,  '  Mist's  Journal,'  and  repress  its  most  obnoxious  attacks. 
In  one  of  the  newly  discovered  letters  he  says,  "  I  ventured  to 
assure  his  Lordship  the  Sting  of  that  mischievous  Paper  should  bt> 
entirely  taken  out,  though  it  was  granted  that  the  style  should 
continue  Tory,  as  it  was,  that  the  Party  might  be  amused,  and  not 
set  up  another,  which  would  have  destroyed  the  design.  And  this 


DANIEL   DEFOE.  349 

Part  I  therefore  take  entirely  on  myself  still."     He  continued  his 
prodigious  literary  activity  to  the  very  last,  dying  in  April  I73I.1 

In  a  proclamation  offering  a  reward  for  his  capture  in  1703 
(after  his  "  Shortest  Way  with  the  Dissenters"),  Defoe  is  described 
as  "  a  middle-sized  spare  man  about  forty  years  old,  of  a  brown 
complexion,  and  dark-brown  hair,  though  he  wears  a  wig,  having 
a  hook  nose,  a  sharp  chin,  grey  eyes,  and  a  large  mole  near  his 
mouth." 

His  constitution  must  have  been  very  robust  to  endure  the 
enormous  amount  of  work  that  he  went  through  in  the  course  of 
his  threescore  and  ten  years  of  life.  Not  only  was  he  constantly 
engaged  in  literary  work,  but,  as  a  secret  agent  of  the  Govern- 
ment, he  managed  harassing  negotiations  and  braved  considerable 
danger — sometimes,  as  he  said  in  his  hyperbolical  way,  "  running 
as  much  risk  as  a  grenadier  on  a  counterscarp."  Of  his  domestic 
life  we  know  nothing,  except  that  he  was  married  and  had  six 
children. 

The  number,  variety,  freshness,  and  popularity  of  Defoe's  works, 
furnish  the  best  possible  evidence  of  the  fertility  and  ingenuity  of 
his  intellect.  For  thirty  years  always  ready  with  something  upon 
every  political  and  social  question  that  was  passing,  he  still  had 
energy,  when  this  excitement  was  over,  to  conquer  a  new  field  of 
literature ;  and  was  quite  as  prolific  on  subjects  of  perennial  and 
universal  interest  as  he  had  been  on  the  more  exciting  topics  of 
the  hour.  The  nature  no  less  than  the  number  of  his  works  con- 
veys the  impression  of  amazing  versatile  energy.  Little  trouble 
has  been  taken  with  the  mere  literary  workmanship ;  the  author 
of  '  Robinson  Crusoe '  can  never  be  classed  among  the  masters  of 
carefully  elaborated  prose.  The  labour  has  been  expended  on 
making  his  narrative  minutely  circumstantial — his  reflection  of 
life  a  picture  of  unparalleled  fidelity  and  detail.  His  novels  are 
in  the  autobiographical  form ;  and  the  circumstances  of  the  vari- 
ous situations,  the  adventures  encountered  by  the  supposed  nar- 
rator, and  the  feelings  of  different  moments,  are  detailed  with  such 
minuteness  that  all  his  fictions  would  pass  for  records  of  actual 
experienca  None  of  our  writers,  not  even  Shakspeare,  shows  half 
such  a  knowledge  of  the  circumstances  of  life  among  different 
ranks  and  conditions  of  men ;  none  of  them  has  realised  with  such 
fidelity  how  so  many  different  persons  lived  and  moved.  He  dis- 
plays especial  subtlety  in  tracing  the  gradual  growth  of  an  opinion 
or  a  purpose,  from  its  first  suggestion  to  its  full  development :  this 
power  meets  us  in  all  his  works,  and  perhaps  nowhere  is  more  con- 

1 1  have  mentioned  only  the  most  prominent  of  Defoe's  writings.  To  mention 
them  all  is  impossible  within  our  limits  ;  the  titles  alone  would  occupy  at  least 
thirty  or  forty  of  our  pages. 


350  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

spicuous  than  in  his  representation  of  the  growth  of  religious  con- 
viction in  the  '  Family  Instructor.' 

Supple  and  versatile  of  intellect,  he  was  not  distinguished  for 
either  intensity  or  delicacy  of  feeling.  He  seems  to  have  been  a 
vain,  impulsive,  audaciously  boastful  sort  of  man.  His  contro- 
versial works  are  brimful  of  happy  egotism ;  he  exults  in  his 
ingenuity  and  clearness  of  vision,  and  boils  over  in  ironical  mock- 
ery of  his  duller  opponents.  It  is  a  tribute  to  his  powers  of  ima- 
gination, but  few  people  will  consider  it  a  compliment  to  his 
honesty,  to  say  that  we  can  believe  hardly  a  word  that  he  tells  Ua 
about  himself.  The  stories  that  he  gives  about  his  youthful 
enthusiasm  in  joining  the  Duke  of  Monmouth,  and  about  the 
unheard-of  persecutions  that  he  suffered  in  later  life,  are  probably 
no  less  fictitious  than  the  adventures  of  Robinson  Crusoe. 

The  characteristics  of  his  intellect  come  out  strongly  in  his 
active  life.  If  the  precepts  in  the  ' Complete  English  Tradesman' 
were  drawn  from  his  own  practice,  he  must  have  been  a  most 
adroit  man  of  business.  His  insinuating  address  was  fully  appre- 
ciated by  those  that  employed  him  on  secret  affairs  of  state.  In 
dealing  with  men,  his  fertile  ingenuity  and  profound  observation 
left  him  never  at  a  loss.  He  would  seem  to  have  been  a  most 
consummate  dissembler ;  his  easy  success  in  playing  the  hypocrite 
gave  him  the  fullest  confidence,  and  his  daring  effrontery  well 
entitled  him  to  Pope's  epithet — "unabaslied  Defoe."  He  was  one 
of  the  most  audaciously  shifty  and  supple  of  men. 

It  is  but  just  to  his  fair  fame  to  add  that  his  hypocrisy  was  not 
turned  to  malevolent  objects  :  if  he  was  not  persecuted  so  much  as 
he  represents,  he  is  not  accused  of  persecuting  others.  He  was 
probably  too  magnanimous  for  personal  grudges.  What  is  more, 
no  discoveries  that  have  yet  been  made  implicate  him  in  transac- 
tions detrimental  to  the  public  good. 

Our  author,  as  we  have  seen,  wrote  something  like  150  treatises 
on  passing  questions  between  1688  and  1715;  an  exhaus'ive 
account  of  his  opinions  would  take  us  over  the  entire  political, 
social,  and  commercial  history  of  that  period.  A  few  of  the  more 
notable  of  his  views  may  be  singled  out.  He  was  a  strong  sup- 
porter of  the  Revolution ;  his  '  True-Born  Englishman  '  was  a 
reply  to  a  personal  attack  on  the  "foreigner"  ruler  and  his  Dutch 
favourites.  He  strongly  opposed  the  war  with  France  ;  we  shall 
quote  from  the  '  Consolidator,'  of  date  1705,  a  satirical  passage 
that  might  have  been  the  basis  of  Swift's  famous  '  Conduct  of  the 
Allies'  in  1711.1  By  birth  a  Dissenter,  he  frequently  made  the 
Higli-fliers,  as  the  High  Churchmen  were  called,  the  objects  of  his 
ridicule;  one  of  these  attacks,  we  have  seen,  landed  him  in  the 

1  See  p.  36-7. 


DANIEL   DEFOE.  351 

pillory  and  in  Newgate.  His  most  considerable  political  achieve- 
ment was  his  share  in  effecting  the  union  between  England  and 
Scotland ;  his  principal  means  of  persuasion  would  seem  to  have 
been  the  ad  vantages  to  Scottish  traders. 

Uis  active  mind  was  fertile  in  practical  projects.  In  1697  he 
published  an  '  Essay  on  Projects.'  "  He  wrote,"  says  Mr  George 
Chalmers,  "  many  sheets  about  the  coin ;  he  proposed  a  register 
for  seamen,  long  before  the  Act  of  Parliament  was  thought  of;  he 
projected  county  banks,  and  factories  for  goods  ;  he  mentioned  a 
proposal  for  a  commission  of  inquiries  into  bankrupts'  estates ;  he 
contrived  a  pension  office  for  the  relief  of  the  poor."  One  of  the 
projects  in  his  'Essay'  was  a  society  on  the  model  of  the  French 
Academy — "  for  encouraging  polite  learning,  for  refining  the  Eng- 
lish language,  and  for  preventing  barbarisms  of  manners." 


ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — A  good  many  of  Defoe's  phrases  are  old-fashioned, 
and  have  long  since  dropped  out  of  current  English.  We  should 
not  be  safe  to  use  an  expression  upon  his  authority.  He  is  an 
excellent  representative  of  the  colloquial  style  of  the  time ;  but 
colloquial  phrases  have  their  day.  Owing  to  his  frequent  use  of 
homely  idioms,  his  writings  are  a  very  rewarding  study  to  verbal 
reformers,  who  desire  to  weed  the  language  of  slip-shod  idioms 
that  have  indolently  been  allowed  to  establish  themselves,  and  who 
are  anxious  to  back  their  proposed  reforms  with  the  practice  of 
elder  writers. 

As  we  should  expect  in  an  author  writing  upon  such  a  variety 
of  topics,  his  command  of  English  is  prodigious.  If  one  may 
judue  from  a  general  impression  of  variety,  no  writer  comes  nearer 
to  the  Shakspearian  profusion  of  languaga  His  sympathies  were 
so  catholic  that  it  is  difficult  to  find  out  in  what  region  he  was 
deficient.  He  is  seldom  declamatory  or  pathetic,  but  when  he  is, 
the  words  seem  to  flow  in  the  choicest  abundance.  The  rich  vein 
in  his  vocabulary  is  easier  to  discover.  From  his  wide  practice  as 
a  controversialist,  he  is  a  great  master  of  the  language  of  sarcasm 
and  abuse ;  even  ISwift's  range  is  probably  not  more  extensive,  as 
his  powers  of  ridicule  were  less  versatile. 

He  was  too  popular  a  writer  to  be  eccentric  in  his  general 
language;  yet  sometimes  in  the  extravagance  of  high  spirits  he 
whimsically  coins  words  that  are  not  unlike  some  of  the  eccentri- 
cities of  Carlyle.  The  following  is  an  example : — 

"  The  yet  further  extravagances  which  naturally  attend  the  mischief  of 
wit,  are  beauism,  dogmaticality,  whimsifi cation,  impudensity,  and  various 
kinds  of  fopperosities  (according  to  Mr  Boyle),  which,  issuing  out  of  the 


352  FROM    1700  TO   1730. 

brain,  descend  into  all  the  faculties,  and  branch  themselves  by  Infinite 
variety  into  all  the  actions  of  life." 

Sentences  and  Paragraphs. — In  this  mechanical  part  of  compo- 
sition our  author  is  singularly  negligent,  especially  in  his  hurried 
political  tracts.  Had  he  been,  like  Temple,  a  careful  builder  of 
sentences — studious  of  the  arts  of  arrangement — he  could  not  have 
produced  one-tenth  of  what  he  wrote.  His  ungrammatical  laxity 
would  not  be  allowed  in  any  modern  writer. 

He  is  so  careless  that  it  would  answer  no  purpose  to  exemplify 
his  errors,  and  so  irregular  that  it  would  not  be  easy  to  discover 
peculiarities  of  structure. 

His  only  merit  lies  in  his  being  consecutiv%.  Whatever  be  the 
distribution  of  the  matter  into  sentences  and  paragraphs,  he  is 
desirous  that  the  connection  be  clearly  apparent,  and  is  very  ex- 
plicit in  his  phrases  of  reference. 

Figures  of  Speech — Similitudes. — Illustrative  force  is  the  most 
remarkable  thing  in  Defoe's  similitudes.  In  conjunction  with  the 
general  spirit  and  vigour  of  his  language,  their  effect  is  electrify- 
ing. Agreeably  to  the  wonderful  discursiveness  of  his  intellect, 
they  are  taken  from  all  sources,  not  forcibly  hunted  out  for  embel- 
lishment, but  used  for  illustration  when  they  present  themselves. 
As  suited  a  vigorous  popular  style,  his  preference  was  for  the 
homely,  and  even  the  coarse.  His  allusions  are  sometimes  learned, 
but  always  easily  understood  from  the  homeliness  of  the  expression. 

We  may  quote  a  few  examples  : — 

"  Dryden  might  have  been  told  his  fate  that,  having  his  extraordinary 
genius  slung  and  pitched  upon  a  swivel,  it  would  certainly  turn  round  as  fast 
as  the  times,  and  instruct  him  how  to  write  elegies  to  Oliver  Cromwell  and 
King  Charles  the  Second  with  all  the  coherence  imaginable  ;  how  to  wiite 
'  Religio  Laici'  and  the  'Hind  and  Panther, 'and  yet  be  the  same  man, 
every  day  to  change  his  principle,  change  his  religion,  change  his  coat, 
change  his  master,  and  yet  never  change  his  nature." 

He  describes,  in  the  following  metaphorical  terms,  the  wonderful 
psychological  revelations  of  the  Chinese  philosopher,  Mira-cho-cho- 
lasmo : — 

"  There  you  have  that  part  of  the  head  turned  inside  outward,  in  which 
nature  has  placed  the  materials  of  reflecting ;  and,  like  a  glass  beehive,  rep- 
resents to  you  all  the  several  cells  in  which  are  lodged  things  past,  even 
back  to  infancy  and  conception.  There  you  have  the  repository,  with  all 
its  cells,  classically,  annually,  numerically,  and  alphabetically  disposed. 
There  you  may  see  how,  when  the  perplexed  animal,  on  the  loss  of  a 
thought  or  a  word,  scratches  his  poll,  every  attack  of  his  invading  fingers 
knocks  at  nature's  door,  alarms  all  the  register-keepers,  and  away  they  run, 
xinlock  all  the  classes,  search  diligently  for  what  he  calls  for,  and  immedi- 
ately deliver  it  up  to  the  brain  ;  if  it  cannot  be  found,  they  entreat  a  little 
patience,  till  they  step  into  the  revolvary,  where  they  run  over  little  cata- 
logues of  the  minutest  passages  of  life,  and  so,  in  time,  never  fail  to  hand 
on  the  thing  ;  if  not  juat  when  he  calls  lor  it,  yet  at  some  other  time." 


DANIEL  DEFOE.  363 

As  an  example  of  his  more  ambitious  illustrations,  take  his  com- 
parison between  the  doctrine  of  passive  obedience  and  the  Coper- 
nicau  system : — 

"  I  take  the  doctrines  of  passive  obedience,  &c.,  among  the  statesmen,  to 
be  like  the  Copernican  system  of  the  earth's  motion  among  philosophers, 
which,  though  it  be  contrary  to  all  ancient  knowledge,  and  not  capable  of 
demonstration,  yet  is  adhered  to  in  general,  because  by  this  they  can  better 
solve  and  give  a  more  rational  account  of  several  dark  phenomena  in  nature 
than  they  could  before. 

"Thus  our  modern  statesmen  approve  of  this  scheme  of  government;  not 
that  it  admits  of  any  rational  defence,  much  less  of  demonstration,  but 
because  by  this  method  they  can  the  better  explain,  as  well  as  defend,  all 
coercion  in  cases  invasive  of  natural  right  than  they  could  before." 

Contrast. — Although  our  author  is  not  a  studious  cultivator  of 
point  or  epigram,  yet  these  arts  form  one  among  his  many  instru- 
ments of  ridicule.  We  shall  produce  two  examples.  The  first  ia 
an  account  of  some  of  the  things  that  he  saw  when  he  visited 
the  moon,  through  a  wonderful  glass  that  penetrated  beneath  all 
disguises  :— 

"  Here  we  saw  the  state  of  the  war  among  nations  ;  here  was  the  French 
giving  sham  thanks  for  victories  they  never  got,  and  somebody  else  address- 
ing and  congratulating  the  sublime  glory  of  running  away;  here  was  Te 
Deum  for  sham  victories  by  laud,  and  there  was  thanksgiving  for  ditto  by 
sea  ;  here  we  might  see  two  armies  fight,  both  run  away,  and  both  come  and 
thank  God  for  nothing.  Here  we  saw  a  plan  of  a  late  war  like  that  in  Ire- 
land; there  was  all  the  officers  cursing  a  Dutch  general,  because  the  damned 
rogue  would  fight  and  spoil  a  good  war,  that,  with  decent  management  and 
good  husbandry,  might  have  been  eked  out  this  twenty  years ;  there  were 
whole  armies  hunting  two  cows  to  one  Irishman,  and  driving  off  black  cattle 
declared  the  noble  end  of  the  war.  Here  we  saw  a  country  full  of  stone 
walls  and  strong  towns,  where,  every  campaign,  the  trade  of  war  was  carried 
on  by  the  soldiers  with  the  same  intriguing  as  it  was  carried  on  in  the  coun- 
cil chambers ;  there  were  millions  of  contributions  raised,  and  vast  sums 
collected,  but  no  taxes  lessened  ;  whole  plate-fleets  surprised,  but  no  treasure 
found ;  vast  sums  lost  by  enemies,  and  yet  never  found  by  friends ;  ships 
loaded  with  volatile  silver,  that  came  away  full  and  got  home  empty  ;  whole 
voyages  made  to  beat  nobody,  and  plunder  everybody ;  two  millions  robbed 
from  the  honest  merchants,  and  not  a  groat  saved  for  the  honest  subjects. 
There  we  saw  captains  listing  men  with  the  Government's  money,  and  let- 
ting them  go  again  for  their  own ;  ships  fitted  out  at  the  rate  of  two  millions 
a -year,  to  fight  but  once  in  three  years,  and  then  run  away  for  want  of 
powder  and  shot." 

The  next  seems  to  be  an  extravagant  parody  of  the  epigram  :— 

"He  told  me,  as  the  inhabitants  were  the  most  numerous,  so  they  were 
the  strangest  people  that  lived;  both  their  natures,  tempers,  qualities, 
actions,  and  way  of  living,  was  made  up  of  innumerable  contradictions ;  that 
they  were  the  wisest  fools  and  the  foolishest  wise  men  in  the  world ;  the 
weakest,  strongest,  richest,  poorest,  most  generous,  covetous,  bold,  cowardly, 
false,  faithful,  sober,  dissolute,  surly,  civil,  slothful,  diligent,  peaceable, 
quarrelling,  loyal,  seditious  nation  that  ever  was  known." 

2 


354  FROM   1700  TO    1730. 

QUALITIES   OF   8TYLK. 

Simplicity. — The  use  of  homely  language  is  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  features  in  Defoe's  style.  It  is  one  of  the  secrets  of 
the  continued  popularity  of  '  Robinson  Crusoe.' 

Two  things  may  be  specially  exemplified  under  this  head.  One 
is,  the  coarse  plainness  of  language  that  he  sometimes  adopted  for 
purposes  of  ridicule ;  and  the  other,  his  orderly  colloquial  exposi- 
tion of  subjects  that  might  have  been  treated  in  a  more  pretentious 
and  abstruse  style. 

As  an  example  of  a  very  undignified  tone  of  banter,  take  the 
beginning  of  his  'Reasons  against  the  Succession  of  the  House 
of  Hanover,'  another  ironical  piece  that  was  taken  for  earnest,  and 
led  to  his  temporary  imprisonment : — 

"  What  strife  is  here  among  you  all  ?  And  what  a  noise  about  who  shall 
or  shall  not  be  king,  the  Lord  knows  when  ?  Is  it  not  a  strange  thing  we 
cannot  be  quiet  with  the  queen  we  have,  but  we  must  all  fall  into  confusion 
and  combustions  about  who  shall  come  after  ?  Why,  pray  folks,  how  old  is 
the  queen,  and  when  is  she  to  die  ?  that  here  is  this  pother  made  about  it. 
I  have  heard  wise  people  say  the  queen  is  not  fifty  years  old,  that  she  has 
no  distemper  but  the  gout,  that  that  is  a  life-long  disease,  which  generally 
holds  people  out  twenty,  or  thirty,  or  forty  years ;  and  let  it  go  how  it  will, 
the  queen  may  well  enough  linger  out  twenty  or  thirty  years,  and  not  be  a 
huge  old  wife  neither.  Now,  what  say  the  people  ?  must  we  think  of  living 
twenty  or  thirty  years  in  this  wrangling  condition  we  are  now  in  ?  This 
would  be  a  torment  worse  than  some  of  the  Egyptian  plagues,  and  would  be 
intolerable  to  bear,  though  for  fewer  years  than  that.  The  animosities  of 
this  nation,  should  they  go  on,  as  it  seems  they  go  on  now,  would  by  time 
become  to  such  a  height,  that  all  charity,  society,  and  mutual  agreement 
among  us,  will  be  destroyed.  Christians  shall  we  he  called  ?  No ;  nothing 
of  the  people  called  Christians  will  be  to  be  found  among  us.  Nothing  of 
Christianity,  Viz.,  charity,  will  be  found  among  us  !  The  name  Christian 
may  be  assumed,  but  it  will  be  all  hypocrisy  and  delusion  ;  the  being  of 
Christianity  must  be  lost  in  the  fog,  and  smoke,  and  stink,  and  noise,  and 
rage,  and  cruelty,  of  our  quarrel  about  a  king.  Is  this  rational  ?  Is  it 
ftcrreeable  to  the  true  interests  of  the  nation  ?  What  must  become  of  trade, 
of  religion,  of  society,  of  relation,  of  families,  of  people  ?  Why,  hark  ye, 
you  folk  that  call  yourselves  rational,  and  talk  of  having  souls,  is  this  a 
token  of  your  having  such  things  about  you,  or  of  your  thinking  rationally  ? 
if  you  have,  pray  what  is  it  likely  will  become  of  you  all  f  Why,  the  strife 
is  gotten  into  your  kitchens,  your  parlours,  your  shops,  your  counting- 
houses,  nay,  into  your  very  beds.  You  gentlefolks,  if  you  please  to  listen 
to  your  cook-maids  and  footmen  in  your  kitchens,  you  shall  hear  them 
scolding,  and  swearing,  and  scratching,  and  fighting  among  themselves ; 
and  when  you  think  the  noise  is  about  the  beef  and  the  pudding,  the  dish- 
water, or  the  kitchen-stuff,  alas,  you  are  mistaken  !  the  feud  is  about  the 
more  mighty  affairs  of  the  government,  and  who  is  for  the  Protestant  succes- 
sion, and  who  for  the  Pretender.  Here  the  poor  despicable  scullions  learn 
to  ciy,  High  Church,  No  Dutch  Kings,  No  Hanover,  that  they  may  do  it 
dexterously  when  they  come  into  the  next  mob.  Here  their  antagonists  of 
the  dripping-pan  practise  the  other  side  clamour,  No  French  Peace,  No 
Pretender,  No  Popery.  The  thing  is  the  very  same  up, "Ac. 


DANIEL  DEFOE.  355 

Examples  of  his  simple  expositions  may  be  found  in  any  page 
of  the  '  Complete  Tradesman,'  The  following  is  a  very  fair  speci- 
men:— 

"Another  trading  license  is  that  of  appointing  and  promising  payments 
of  money,  which  men  in  business  are  oftentimes  forced  to  make,  and  forced 
to  break,  without  any  scruple ;  nay,  and  without  any  reproach  upon  their 
integrity.  Let  us  state  this  case  as  clearly  as  we  can,  and  see  how  it  stumls 
as  to  the  morality  of  it,  for  that  is  the  point  in  debate. 

"The  credit  usually  given  by  one  tradesman  to  another,  as  particulaily 
by  the  merchant  to  the  wholesale  man,  and  by  the  wholesale-man  to  tiie  re- 
tailer, is  such,  that,  without  tying  the  buyer  up  to  a  particular  day  of  pay- 
ment, they  go  on  buying  and  selling,  and  the  buyer  pays  money  upon 
account,  as  his  convenience  admits,  and  as  the  seller  is  content  to  take  it. 
This  occasions  the  merchant  or  the  wholesale-man  to  go  about,  as  they 
call  it,  a-dunning  among  their  dealers,  and  which  is  generally  the  work  of 
every  Saturday.  When  the  merchant  comes  to  his  customer  the  wholesale  - 
man,  or  warehouse-keeper,  for  money,  he  tells  him,  '  I  have  no  money,  sir  ; 
I  cannot  pay  you  now ;  if  you  call  next  week,  I  will  pay  you.'  Next  week 
conies,  and  the  merchant  calls  again ;  but  it  is  the  same  thing,  only  the 
•warehouseman  adds,  '  Well,  I  will  pay  you  next  week,  without  fail.'  When 
the  week  comes,  he  tells  him  he  has  met  with  great  disappointments,  and 
he  knows  not  what  to  do,  but  desires  his  patience  another  week :  and  when 
the  other  week  comes,  perhaps  he  pays  him,  and  so  they  go  on. 

"  Now,  what  is  to  be  said  for  this  ?  In  the  first  place,  let  us  look  back  to 
the  occasion.  This  warehouse-keeper,  or  wholesale-man,  sells  the  goods 
which  he  buys  of  the  merchant — I  say  he  sells  them  to  the  retailers,  and  it 
is  for  that  reason  I  place  it  first  there.  Now,  as  they  buy  in  smaller  <|iinn- 
tities  than  he  did  of  the  merchant,  so  he  deals  with  more  of  them  in  number, 
and  he  goes  about  among  them  the  same  Saturday,  to  get  in  money  that  he 
may  pay  his  merchant,  and  he  receives  his  bag  full  of  promises,  too,  every- 
where instead  of  money,  and  is  put  off  from  week  to  week,  perhaps  by  fifty 
shopkeepers  in  a  day ;  and  their  serving  him  thus  obliges  him  to  do  the 
same  to  the  merchant. 

"Again,  come  to  the  merchant.  Except  some  whose  circumstances  are 
above  it,  they  are  by  this  veiy  \isage  obliged  to  put  off  the  Blackwellhall 
factor,  or  the  packer,  or  the  clothier,  or  whoever  they  deal  with,  in  propor- 
tion ;  and  thus  promises  go  round  for  payment,  and  those  promises  are  kept 
or  t'roken  as  money  comes  in,  or  as  disappointments  happen:  and  all  this 
while  there  is  no  breach  of  honesty,  or  parole ;  no  lying,  or  supposition  of 
it,  among  the  tradesmen,  either  on  one  side  or  other. 

"  But  let  us  come,  I  say,  to  the  morality  of  it.  To  break  a  solemn  pro- 
mise is  a  kind  of  prevarication ;  that  is  certain,  there  is  no  coming  off  of  it ; 
and  I  might  enlarge  here  upon  the  first  fault,  namely  of  making  the  pro- 
mise, which,  say  the  strict  objectors,  they  should  not  do.  But  the  trades- 
man's answer  is  this:  all  those  promises  ought  to  betaken  as  they  are  made 
— namely,  with  a  contingent  dependence  upon  the  circumstances  of  trade, 
such  as  promises  made  them  by  others  who  owe  them  money,  or  the  supposi- 
tion of  a  week's  trade  bringing  in  money  by  retail,  as  usual,  both  of  which 
are  liable  to  fail  or  at  least  to  fall  short ;  and  this  the  person  who  culls  for 
the  money  knows,  and  takes  the  promise  with  those  attending  casualties; 
which  if  they  fail,  he  knows  the  shopkeeper  or  whoever  he  is,  must  fail  him 
too." 

Clearness. — The  last-quoted  passage  is  a  specimen  of  our  author's 


356  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

most  distinct  style  of  expression.  When,  as  in  the  above  case,  he 
is  put  upon  his  mettle  to  be  perspicuous,  lie  observes  a  certain 
precision  of  method,  giving  express  notice  when  he  passes  from 
one  consideration  to  another :  "In  the  first  place,  let  us  look  back 
to  the  occasion  ; "  "  Again,  come  to  the  merchant ; "  "  But  let  us 
come,  I  say,  to  the  morality  of  it."  But  he  writes  too  hurriedly 
to  be  precise  in  expression.  When  we  study  for  a  little  what  he 
writes,  we  can  see  that  he  has  a  clear  and  vigorous  mind,  and  is 
seldom  oppressed  by  confusion  of  thought.  But  his  expression  is 
often  imperfect.  He  hurries  on,  and  is  content  to  leave  it  incom- 
plete. The  above  phrases  of  transition,  for  example,  are  incom- 
plete— the  first  particularly.  We  see  what  they  mean  after  we 
have  read  the  paragraph  they  introduce,  but  not  before. 

Strength. —  Defoe's  general  style  may  be  described  as  nervous. 
It  has  the  strength  arising  from  variety,  copiousness,  and  vigorous 
fitness  of  plain  words  and  metaphors,  with  an  occasional  "  tang " 
of  antithesis. 

He  wants  the  power  of  sonorous  declamation ;  as  may  be  seen  in 
the  coarse  vigour  of  his  familiar  expostulation  with  the  people  of 
England  concerning  their  political  dissensions.  In  his  '  Seasonable 
Warning  and  Caution,'  touching  the  same  theme,  he  attempts  a 
loftier  flight,  but  mars  the  effect  by  occasional  expressions  in  his 
more  usual  tone  of  familiarity.  Thus — 

"  Why,  how  now,  England  1  what  ailest  thee  now  ?  What  evil  spirit 
now  possesseth  thee  ?  0  thou  nation  famous  for  espousing  religion,  and 
defending  liberty;  finiuent  in  all  :iges  for  pulling  down  tyrants,  and  adher- 
ing steadily  to  the  fundamentals  of  thy  own  constitution:  that  has  not  only 
secured  thy  own  rights,  and  handed  them  down  unimpared  to  every  suc- 
ceeding age,  but  has  been  the  sanctuary  of  other  oppressed  nations  ;  the 
strong  protector  of  injured  subjects  against  the  lawless  invasion  of  oppress- 
ing  tyrants. 

"To  thee  the  oppressed  Protestants  of  France  owed,  for  some  ages  ago, 
the  comfort  of  being  powerfully  supported,  while  their  own  king,  wheedled 
by  the  lustre  of  a  crown,  became  apostate,  and  laid  the  foundation  of  their 
ruin  among  themselves  ;  in  thee  their  posterity  find  a  refuge,  and  flourish 
in  thy  wealth  and  trade,  when  religion  and  liberty  find  no  more  place  in 
their  own  country. 

"  To  thee  the  distressed  Belgii  owe  the  powerful  assistance  by  which  they 
took  up  arms  in  defence  of  liberty  and  religion  against  Spanish  cruelty,  the 
perfidious  tyranny  of  their  kings,  and  the  rage  of  the  bloody  Duke  d'Alva. 

"...  But  what  has  all  this  been  for  ?  And  to  what  intent  and 
purpose  was  all  this  zeal,  if  you  will  sink  under  the  ruin  of  the  very  fabric 
ye  have  pulled  down  ?  If  you  will  give  up  the  cause  after  ye  have  gained  the 
advantage,  and  yield  yourselves  up  after  you  have  been  delivered;  to  what 
purpose  then  has  all  this  been  done  f  Why  all  this  money  expended?  Why 
all  this  blood  spilt?  To  what  end  is  France  said  to  be  reduced,  and  peace 
now  concluded,  if  the  same  Popery,  the  same  tyranny,  the  same  arbitrary 
methods  of  government  shall  be  received  among  you  again  ?  Sure  your  pos- 
terity will  stand  amazed  to  consider  how  lavish  thi^s  age  has  been  of  their 
money  aud  their  blood,  and  to  how  little  purpose;  since  no  age  since  the 


DANIEL   DEFOE.  35? 

CTwttion  of  the  world  can  show  us  a  time  whenever  any  nation  spent  BO 
much  blood  and  treasure  to  end  just  where  they  begun  :  as,  it  the  arts  o/ 
our  enemies  prevail,  we  are  like  to  do." 

His  homely  nervous  style  is  well  suited  to  the  relation  of  lively 
horrors,  or  of  exciting  commotions,  such  as  riots  and  mutinies.  In 
recording  the  alarms  caused  by  the  fear  of  infection  during  the 
Great  Plague  of  1665,  he  is  incomparably  graphic  and  impressive. 
He  produces  his  effects  not  by  ponderous  epithets,  or  impressive 
reflections,  but  by  the  accumulation  of  striking  details  in  homely 
language.  As  an  example  : — 

"Another  infected  person  came  and  knocked  at  the  door  of  a  citizen's 
house,  where  they  knew  him  very  well ;  the  servant  let  him  in,  and  being 
told  the  master  of  the  house  was  above,  he  ran  up,  and  came  into  the  room 
to  them  as  the  whole  family  were  at  supper.  They  began  to  rise  up  a  little 
surprised,  not  knowing  what  the  matter  was;  but  he  bade  them  sit  still,  he 

only  came  to  take  his  leave  of  them.     They  asked  him,  '  Why,  Mr , 

where  are  you  going f  'Going,'  says  he,  'I  have  got  the  sickness,  and 
shall  die  to-morrow  night.'  It  is  easy  to  believe,  though  not  to  describe, 
the  consternation  they  were  all  in  ;  the  women  and  the  man's  daughters, 
which  were  but  little  girls,  were  frightened  almost  to  death,  and  got  up,  all 
running  out,  one  at  one  door  and  one  at  another,  some  down-stairs  and  some 
up-stairs,  and  getting  together  as  well  as  they  could,  locked  themselves  into 
their  chambers,  and  screamed  out  at  the  window  for  help,  as  if  they  had 
been  frighted  out  of  their  wits.  The  master,  more  composed  than  they, 
though  both  frighted  and  provoked,  was  going  to  lay  hands  on  him  and 
throw  him  down-stairs,  being  in  a  passion  ;  but  then  considering  a  little  the 
condition  of  the  man,  and  the  danger  of  touching  him,  horror  seized  his 
mind,  and  he  stood  like  one  astonished.  The  poor  distempered  man,  all 
this  while,  being  as  well  diseased  in  his  brain  as  in  his  body,  stood  still  like 
oue  amazed ;  at  length  he  turns  round,  '  Ay  1 '  says  he,  with  all  the  seeming 
calmness  imaginable,  '  is  it  so  with  you  all  ?  Are  you  all  disturbed  at  me  ? 
"Why,  then,  I'll  e'en  go  home  and  die  there.'  And  so  he  goes  immediately 
down-stairs.  The  servant  that  had  let  him  in  goes  down  after  him  with  a 
candle,  but  was  afraid  to  go  past  him  and  open  the  door,  so  he  stood  on  the 
stairs  to  see  what  he  would  do  ;  the  man  went  and  opened  the  door,  and 
went  out  and  flung  the  door  after  him." 

Tlie  Ludicrous. — The  extravagance  of  Defoe's  sense  of  the  ludi- 
crous is  in  proportion  to  the  marvellous  energy  of  the  man.  He 
deals  in  the  same  kind  of  undisguised  banter  as  Macaulay ;  only 
he  is  more  exuberant,  stands  less  upon  his  dignity,  hits  fearlessly 
at  greater  antagonists,  and  altogether  has  a  more  magnanimous 
air.  At  the  risk  of  being  formal,  we  may  compare  him  with  the 
other  three  great  prose  wits  in  this  age  of  wits,  Addison,  Steele, 
and  Swift.  He  is  more  openly  derisive  and  less  bitter  than  Addi- 
son, having  no  mastery  of  the  polite  sneer :  he  is  not  a  loving 
humorist  like  Steele,  but  sarcastically  and  derisively  humorous  ; 
and  he  is  more  magnanimous  and  less  personal  than  Swift,  dealing 
with  public  not  with  private  conduct,  and  carrying  into  the  war- 
fare a  spirit  less  savagely  ferocious. 


358  FROM    1700  TO    1730. 

Passages  already  quoted  illustrate  the  extravagance  of  his  hu- 
mour, as  it  appears  in  epigrammatic  paradox,  and  in  the  application 
of  very  homely  language  to  affairs  usually  treated  with  stiff  dignity. 
His  '  Consolidator,  or  Memoirs  of  Sundry  Transactions  from  the 
Moon,'  is,  as  we  should  expect  from  the  title,  full  of  extravagant 
fun — so  extravagant  that  the  satire  is  converted  into  humour.  In 
the  passage  quoted  concerning  the  Irish  and  French  wars  (p.  353), 
the  satire  is  predominant ;  but  very  often  he  loses  sight  of  his 
polemical  purpose,  and  gives  a  loose  rein  to  his  powers  of  ludicrous 
invention.  The  metaphorical  description  of  the  discoveries  of  the 
great  psychologist  (p.  352)  is  a  fair  example.  Here  is  another  : — 

"If  these  labours  of  mine  shall  prove  successful,  I  may,  in  my  next  journey 
that  way,  take  an  abstract  of  their  most  admirable  tracts  in  navigation,  and 
the  mysteries  of  Chinese  mathematics  ;  which  outdo  all  modern  invention 
at  that  rate,  that  it  is  inconceivable ;  in  this  elaborate  work  I  must  run 
through  the  365  volumes  of  Augro-machi-lanquaro-zi,  the  most  ancient 
mathematician  in  all  China  ;  from  thence  I  shall  give  a  description  of  a 
fleet  of  ships  of  a  hundred  thousand  sail,  built  at  the  expense  of  the  emperor 
Tangro  the  XVth. ;  who,  having  notice  of  the  general  deluge,  prepared  these 
vessels,  to  every  city  and  town  in  his  dominions  one,  and  in  bulk  propor- 
tioned to  the  number  of  its  inhabitants ;  into  which  vessel  all  the  people, 
with  such  movables  as  they  thought  fit  to  save,  and  with  a  hundred  and 
twenty  days'  provisions,  were  received  at  the  time  of  the  flood ;  and  the 
rest  of  their  goods  being  put  into  great  vessels  made  of  China  ware,  and  fast 
luted  down  on  the  top,  were  preserved  unhurt  by  the  water :  these  ships 
they  furnished  with  six  hundred  fathom  of  chain  instead  of  cables,  which 
being  fastened  by  wonderful  arts  to  the  earth,  every  vessel  rid  out  the 
deluge  just  at  the  town's  end  ;  so  that  when  the  waters  abated,  the  people 
had  nothing  to  do  but  to  open  the  doors  made  in  the  ship-sides  and  come 
out,  repair  their  houses,  open  the  great  China  pots  their  goods  were  in,  and 
so  put  themselves  in  statu  quo." 

One  of  the  most  striking  features  in  our  author's  wit  is  his 
power  of  irony.  Of  this  power  he  received  very  disagreeable 
proof  :  his  ironical  proposal,  '  The  Shortest  Way  with  the  Dissent- 
ers,' was  praised  by  the  extreme  High-fliers  as  an  admirable  idea, 
and  the  mocking  author  imprisoned  when  they  discovered  to  their 
fury  how  they  had  been  cheated ;  and  eleven  years  later,  his  iron- 
ical '  Reasons  against  the  Succession  of  the  House  of  Hanover '  was 
misinterpreted  by  the  Government,  and  much  to  his  surprise,  he 
was  incarcerated  as  a  genuine  Jacobite.  We  have  quoted  the 
opening  of  the  latter  piece.  The  following  is  a  portion  of  the 
mock  declamation  of  his  '  Shortest  Way ' : — 

"  It  is  now  near  fourteen  years  that  the  glory  and  peace  of  the  purest  and 
most  flourishing  church  in  the  world  has  been  eclipsed,  buffeted,  and  dis- 
turbed, by  a  sort  of  men  who  God  in  His  providence  has  suffered  to  insult 
over  her,  and  bring  her  down  ;  these  have  been  the  days  of  her  humiliation 
and  tribulation.  She  was  born  with  an  invincible  patience,  the  reproach  of 
the  wicked,  and  Cod  has  nf  Inst  heard  her  prayers,  and  delivered  her  from 
the  opprcbsiou  of  ;  lie  .itnmytT. 


DANIEL  DEFOE.  359 

"  And  now  they  find  their  day  is  over,  their  power  gone,  and  the  throne 
of  this  nation  possessed  by  a  royal,  English,  true,  and  ever-constant  member 
of,  and  friend  to  the  Church  of  England.  Now  that  they  find  they  are  in 
danger  of  the  Church  of  England's  just  resentments;  now  they  cry  out 
peace,  union,  forbearance,  and  charity,  as  if  the  Church  had  not  too  long 
harboured  her  enemies  under  her  wing,  and  nourished  the  viperous  brood, 
till  they  hiss  and  fly  in  the  face  of  the  mother  that  cherished  them. 

"  No,  gentlemen,  the  time  of  mercy  is  past,  your  day  of  grace  is  over ; 
you  should  have  practised  peace  and  moderation,  and  charity,  if  you 
expectrd  any  yourselves. 

"  We  have  heard  more  of  this  lesson  for  fourteen  years  past.  We  have 
been  huffed  and  bullied  with  your  Act  of  Toleration  ;  you  have  told  us  that 
you  are  the  Church  established  by  law,  as  well  as  others ;  have  set  up  your 
canting  synagogues  at  our  church-doors,  and  the  church  and  members  have 
been  loaded  with  reproaches,  with  oaths,  associations,  abjurations,  and  what 
not ;  where  has  been  the  mercy,  the  forbearance,  the  charity,  you  have 
shown  to  tender  consciences  of  the  Church  of  England,  that  could  not  take 
oaths  as  fast  as  you  made  them  ?  that  having  sworn  allegiance  to  their  lawful 
and  rightful  king,  could  not  dispense  with  that  oath,  their  king  being  still 
alive,  and  swear  to  your  new  hodge-podge  of  a  Dutch  Government  ?  These 
have  been  turned  out  of  their  livings,  and  they  and  their  families  left  to 
starve  ;  their  estates  double  taxed,  to  carry  on  a  war  they  had  no  hand  in, 
and  you  got  nothing  by.  What  account  can  you  give  of  the  multitudes  you 
have  forced  to  comply,  against  their  consciences,  with  your  new  sophistical 
politics,  who,  like  new  converts  in  France,  sin  because  they  can't  starve  1 
And  now  the  tables  are  turned  upon  you,  you  must  not  be  persecuted,  'tia 
not  a  Christian  spirit ! 

"  Your  management  of  your  Dutch  monarch,  whom  you  reduced  to  a  mere 

king  of  cl s,  is  enough  to  give  any  future  princes  such  an  idea  of  your 

principles,  as  to  warn  them  sufficiently  from  coming  into  your  clutches ; 
and,  God  be  thanked,  the  Queen  is  out  of  your  hands,  knows  you,  and  will 
have  a  care  of  you." 

KINDS  OF  COMPOSITION. 

Defoe,  as  is  testified  by  every  page  of  his  writings,  excelled  in 
the  graphic  presentation  both  of  concrete  things  and  of  states  of 
mind.  He  did  not  attempt  comprehensive  formal  delineations  of 
complicated  scenes,  and  so  does  not  exhibit  Descriptive  method  in 
its  most  difficult  application,;  yet  he  must  be  allowed  to  be  one  of 
our  greatest  masters  of  single  descriptive  touches. 

One  variety  of  descriptive  method,  indeed,  he  may  be  said  to 
have  employed,  and  that  with  the  highest  success — the  presenta- 
tion of  scenes  from  the  traveller's  point  of  view.  He  puts  before 
us  the  various  features  of  a  country  as  they  turn  up  in  his  narra- 
tive. There  is  no  full  description  of  Robinson  Crusoe's  island  in 
any  one  place,  but  particular  is  added  to  particular  as  they  oc- 
curred to  Robinson  himself,  and  before  the  close  of  the  narrative 
we  know  the  island  from  shore  to  shore.  He  acts  upon  the  same 
plan  in  all  his  narratives.  One  of  his  narratives  in  particular,  his 
'  Voyage  Round  the  World,'  is  framed  expressly  for  descriptive 
purposes ;  in  that  work  his  main  object  is  to  present  a  systematic 


360  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

body  of  his  multifarious  knowledge  concerning  foreign  countries, 
foreign  trade,  and  foreign  adventures,  by  sea  and  by  land. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  he  observes  the  cardinal  rule  of 
description,  the  inaugural  presentation  of  a  comprehensive  view, 
lie  fills  in  the  picture  by  degrees,  but  he  begins  by  drawing  the 
general  outline.  One  of  the  first  things  that  Robinson  Crusoe 
does  is  to  go  to  the  top  of  a  hill  and  view  the  country : — 

"  After  I  had  with  great  labour  and  difficulty  got  to  the  top,  I  saw  my 
fate,  to  my  great  affliction,  viz.,  that  I  was  in  an  island  environed  every 
way  with  the  sea,  no  land  to  be  seen  except  some  rocks,  which  lay  a  great 
way  off,  and  two  small  islands,  less  than  this,  which  lay  about  three  leagues 
to  the  west.  I  found  also  that  the  island  I  was  in  was  barren,  and,  as  I  saw 
good  reason  to  believe,  uninhabited,  except  by  wild  beasts,  of  whom,  how- 
ever, I  saw  none." 

Another  thing  worth  observing  in  his  descriptions  is  that  he 
has  a  Herodotean  knack  of  giving  numerical  measures  of  extent, 
and  of  indicating  the  lie  of  a  country  by  a  reference  to  the  points 
of  the  compass.  This  is  one  of  his  arts  for  giving  an  air  of  reality 
to  his  narratives. 

The  Narrative  art  of  so  successful  a  story-teller  as  Defoe  de- 
serves careful  study.  He  chooses  the  simplest  form  of  narration, 
the  record  by  an  individual  of  incidents  that  have  happened  within 
his  personal  knowledge.  His  narratives  are  all  autobiographical 
In  his  '  Memoirs  of  a  Cavalier,'  and  others  of  his  works,  he  mingles 
general  accounts  of  public  transactions  that  the  Cavalier  took  part 
in  with  the  narrative  of  personal  adventures;  but  it  is  in  the 
narrative  of  personal  adventures  that  the  interest  of  the  work 
consists. 

The  question  arises,  Does  he  show  any  art  beyond  the  accumu- 
lation of  interesting  incidents :  does  he  show  skill  in  the  order  of 
presenting  them  1  Apart  from  the  question  of  interest, — which, 
it  is  superfluous  to  say,  Defoe  sustains  with  unique  power, — his 
narrative  is  eminently  perspicuous.  He  has,  to  be  sure,  no  com- 
plicated difficulties  to  overcome,  but  he  observes  all  the  conditions 
of  perspicuity  for  the  simple  forms  of  narrative  that  he  professes : 
when  he  shifts  the  scene,  he  gives  the  reader  distinct  intimation  of 
the  change ;  when  new  agents  are  introduced,  their  appearance  is 
expressly  announced ;  and  he  does  not  depart  from  the  order  of 
events  without  an  apology  and  ample  explanation.  And  as  he  is 
tolerably  exact  in  his  measurement  of  space,  so  he  is  tolerably 
exact  in  his  measurement  of  time :  the  assigning  of  definite  dates 
also  helps  to  keep  up  the  air  of  reality.  We  have  mentioned  these 
various  items  of  lucidity  without  qualification  :  it  should  be  added, 
that  thoujrh  Defoe  observes  these  conditions  in  the  main,  his  nar- 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  361 

ratives  were  for  the  most  part  written  hurriedly,  and  the  close 
reader  finds  an  occasional  confusion. 

For  popular  Exposition,  apart  from  his  general  felicity  of  lan- 
guage, Defoe  had  two  strong  cards :  a  multifarious,  and,  compara- 
tively speaking,  inexhaustible  command  of  examples  and  com- 
parisons. His  '  Complete  English  Tradesman '  is  a  manual  of 
advice  that  still  finds  readers. 


JONATHAN    SWIFT,  1667-1745. 

The  author  of  'Gulliver's  Travels,'  the  eccentric  Dean  of  St 
Patrick's  in  Ireland,  has  been  all  but  universally  acknowledged  as 
the  most  vigorous  and  grammatical  writer  of  English  anterior  to 
Johnson. 

fle  was  born  in  Dublin,  the  posthumous  son  of  Jonathan  Swift, 
a  native  of  Yorkshire,  said  to  be  second  cousin  to  the  poet  Dry- 
den  ;  and  was  educated  by  the  charity  of  an  uncle  at  the  school  of 
Kilkenny,  and  at  Trinity  College,  Dublin.  He  entered  the  world, 
ut  the  age  of  twenty-one,  as  private  secretary  to  Sir  William 
Temple,  who  had  married  a  relative  of  his  mother.  This  post  he 
held,  with  a  brief  interval,  for  eleven  years,  remaining  in  the  Moor 
Park  family  till  the  death  of  Sir  William  in  1699.  Again  thrown 
on  his  own  resources,  he  was  for  a  short  time  chaplain  in  the 
family  of  Lord  Berkeley,  and  from  him  obtained  in  1700  the 
livings  01'  Laracor  and  Rathbeggin  in  the  diocese  of  Meath.  He 
rose  to  no  higher  preferment  till  made  Dean  of  St  Patrick's  by  his 
Tory  friends  in  1713. 

Like  other  literary  men  of  the  time,  he  took  an  interest  in  pol- 
itics, and  wrote  with  a  political  aim.  His  first  publication,  '  Dis- 
sensions in  Athens  and  Rome,'  appeared  in  1701,  when  the  author 
was  thirty-four  years  of  age :  it  relates  the  evil  consequences  of 
dissensions  between  Nobles  and  Commons  in  the  ancient  states, 
and  points  a  moral  against  the  quarrelsome  behaviour  of  the  Eiig- 
lish  Commons  The  anonymous  'Tale  of  a  Tub,' — a  satire  on 
religious  dissensions  and  the  self-sufficiency  of  the  different 
Churches,  filled  out  with  numerous  satirical  digressions  on  vari-, 
ous  subjects, — was  written  about  1696,  and  first  published  in 
1704.  Along  with  the  'Tale  of  a  Tub'  appeared  'The  Battle  of 
the  Books ' — a  burlesque  on  Temple's  opponents  in  the  Ancient 
versus  Modern  controversy.  In  1708  he  took  a  leading  place 
among  the  wits  by  his  ridicule  of  John  Partridge,  the  Philomath 
or  Astrologer.  This  performance  made  the  name  of  Isaac  Bicker- 
staff  one  of  the  most  popular  in  town,  for  whicL  reason  it  was 
assumed  by  Steele  when  he  began  the  'Tatler.'  From  1710  to 
1714,  the  four  last  years  of  Queen  Anne's  r^ign,  he  was  the  chief 


3G2  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

literary  support  of  the  Tory  Administration,  writing  the  '  Conduct 
of  the  Allies,'  the  '  Letter  to  the  October  Club,'  the  '  Examiner,' 
and  other  telling  compositions.  His  '  Journal  to  Stella '  was  writ- 
ten during  his  residence  in  London  at  this  period.  When  George 
came  to  the  throne,  and  the  power  of  government  passed  to  the 
Whigs,  he  retired  to  his  Irish  deanery.  Ten  years  thereafter  he 
made  a  great  sensation  in  the  political  world,  and  gained  unex- 
ampled popularity  in  Ireland,  by  his  '  Drapier's  Letters,"  written 
against  Wood's  patent  for  a  copper  coinage.  The  letters  raised 
such  a  commotion  that  the  patent  had  to  be  revoked.  '  Gulliver's 
Travels'  was  published  in  1726-27,  and  "was  received  with  such 
avidity  that  the  price  of  the  first  edition  was  raised  before  the 
second  could  be  marta" 

Swift's  relations  with  Stella  and  Vanessa — Miss  Johnson  and 
Miss  Vanhomrigh — are  too  complicated  to  be  here  entered  upon 
at  length.  Stella  passed  as  a  daughter  of  Sir  William  Temple's 
steward,  but  was  believed  to  be  the  natural  daughter  of  Sir  William 
himself.  When  Swift  went  to  Ireland  he  persuaded  her  to  come 
and  live  near  him  under  the  charge  of  Mrs  Dingley,  kept  up  with 
her  all  the  intimacy  of  a  Platonic  friendship,  and  latterly  was 
united  to  her  by  a  private  marriage,  though  the  connection  was 
for  some  reason  or  other  never  publicly  acknowledged.  His  rela- 
tions with  Miss  Vanhomrigh  were  less  mysterious,  but  more  trag- 
ical. As  her  literary  tutor,  he  suffered  or  encouraged  her  to  fall 
passionately  in  love  with  him.  Warm-hearted  and  impetuous,  she 
made  him  an  offer  of  marriage ;  and  when  he  equivocated  and 
urged  delay,  she  threw  reserve  aside,  and  pursued  the  unusual 
suit  with  warm  entreaty  and  argument.  She  died  of  a  broken 
heart,  on  discovering  the  Dean's  intimacy  with  Stella. 

Swift  is  described  by  Sir  Walter  Scott  as  "  in  person  tall,  strong, 
and  well  made,  of  a  dark  complexion,  but  with  blue  eyes,  black 
an  I  bushy  eyebrows,  nose  somewhat  aquiline,  and  features  which 
remarkably  expressed  the  stern,  haughty,  and  dauntless  turn  of 
his  mind." 

It  needed  considerable  constitutional  strength  to  support  the 
astonishing  force  of  his  character ;  yet  there  would  seem  to  have 
been  some  radical  disorder  in  his  system.  From  our  earliest 
records  of  his  behaviour,  he  was  excessively  irritable,  at  times  even 
savagely  so.  He  could  not  endure  to  accommodate  himself  to 
people ;  he  either  gloomily  held  his  tongue,  or  overbore  opposition 
with  fierce  impatience.  We  can  hardly  explain  this  without  sup- 
posing some  radical  distemper ;  it  may  have  been  the  uneasy 
beginnings  of  the  brain  disease  that  afterwards  unhinged  his 
reason. 

Taken  as  a  whole,  his  writings  leave  upon  our  minds  a  wonder- 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  363 

ful  impression  of  persistent  originality,  analogical  power,  effective 
eloquence,  and  wit.  We  feel  his  originality  most  vividly  when  we 
compare  his  works  with  the  works  of  writers  less  powerful  or  less 
persistently  concentrated;  when,  for  example,  we  compare  his 
'  Tale  of  a  Tub '  with  Defoe's  '  Shortest  Way  with  Dissenters/  or 
his  'Gulliver's  Travels'  with  Defoe's  'Voyage  to  the  Moon.' 
Defoe's  performances  have  the  originality  of  first  thoughts  dashed 
off  hastily — originality,  as  it  were,  of  the  first  remove.  Swift's 
performances  appear  as  the  outcome  of  strong  powers  working  up 
to  a  high  ideal;  remodelling  first  thoughts  and  still  remaining 
unsatisfied  ;  climbing,  stage  after  stage,  to  a  transcendently  impos- 
ing altitude  above  the  common  level  A  man  with  his  quickness 
of  thought  would  probably  find  some  ludicrous  parallel  upon  the 
first  endeavour  ;  but  he  was  not  content  until  he  had  discovered  a 
parallel  that  should  be  supremely  ludicrous.  The  surprising  per- 
sistence and  power  of  his  efforts  appears  not  less  in  the  quantity 
than  in  the  quality  of  his  analogies.  In  the  '  Tale  of  a  Tub '  and 
in  '  Gulliver's  Travels,'  the  multitude  as  well  as  the  aptness  of  the 
parallels  between  the  imaginary  narrative  and  the  facts  allegorised 
are  absolutely  unrivalled  among  works  of  that  nature,  and  could 
have  been  conceived  only  by  the  greatest  powers  at  the  maximum 
of  intense  concentration.  He  was  famous  for  quick  flashes  of 
extempore  wit ;  in  an  age  of  brilliant  talkers,  he  held  one  of  the 
highest  places.  But  the  requirements  for  his  sustained  composi- 
tions embraced  something  over  and  above  this :  '  Gulliver's  Tra- 
vels '  needed  steady  application  as  well  as  quickness  of  analogical 
energy.  There  were  men  in  the  Queen  Anne  period  that  held 
their  own  with  Swift  in  the  social  interchange  of  wit,  as  there 
were  men  more  delicate  in  criticism  and  more  sagacious  in  state- 
craft ;  but  he  stood  alone  in  the  rare  combination  of  subtle  wit 
with  demoniac  perseverance. 

In  some  of  his  writings  he  displays  intense  feeling;  we  read 
hardly  a  page  without  encountering  some  stroke  of  passion. 
Strong  egotism  is  more  or  less  involved  in  all  his  emotional  mani- 
festations. He  was,  as  we  have  said,  savagely  impatient  of  the 
slightest  contradiction.  If  either  a  person  or  an  institution  jarred 
with  his  notions  of  what  it  ought  to  be  or  ought  to  do,  his  rage 
was  instantaneous  and  irrepressible.1  In  his  Journal  to  Stella, 
indeed,  he  expressed  himself  with  the  most  passionate  fondness. 
But  this  was  not  inconsistent  with  the  irritable  egotism  that  else- 
where displayed  itself  as  the  ruling  passion  of  his  nature.  It  was, 
indeed,  an  outcome  of  the  same  passion  in  an  allotropic  form  :  in- 
tense affection  for  an  intimate  companion  is  describabie  as  an 

1  The  gross  violations  of  decency  in  his  writings  are  referable  to  the  same 
intense  egotism  ;  he  delighted  to  shock  conventional  notions,  aud  to  brave  con- 
tradiction or  rebuke. 


304  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

expanded  egotism.  While  Swift  was  in  London,  Stella  was  to 
him  an  alter  fyo,  another  self ;  there  were  none  of  the  irritations 
of  actual  companionship  to  break  the  flow  of  his  tenderness. 

His  conduct  both  in  public  and  in  private  was  determined  by 
imperious  irritable  pride.  He  was  immoderately  fond  of  the  ex- 
ercise of  power,  and  ungovernably  restless  under  authority.  He 
must  have  his  own  way  for  the  moment,  come  what  would.  He 
has  not  been  proved  guilty  of  mean  selfishness  or  of  malice.  On 
the  contrary,  he  showed  himself  on  several  occasions  public- 
spirited  and  charitable.  But  both  his  public  spirit  and  his  charity 
were  to  this  extent  egotistic  that  he  insisted  dictatorially  upon  his 
own  schemes  for  the  good  of  the  party  interested.  As  a  clergy- 
man, "discharging  his  duties  with  punctuality,"  his  ruling  pas- 
sion came  out  in  dictatorial  schemes  for  improving  the  condition 
of  his  parishioners,  and  savage  contempt  for  the  idleness  and  over- 
populating  fecundity  that  marred  his  plans.  During  his  four 
years'  importance  at  Court,  he  is  described  as  lording  it  over  the 
highest  officers  of  state,  treating  them  with  the  air  of  a  patron, 
"affecting  rather  to  dictate  than  advise."  In  private  company, 
though  esteemed  the  greatest  wit  of  the  age,  he  behaved  at  times 
with  the  same  rude  imperiousness.  A  story  is  told  of  his  per- 
emptorily bidding  Lady  Burlington  "  sing  him  a  song,"  and,  when 
she  refused,  threatening  to  make  her  sing  when  he  bade  her.  In 
the  rampant  moments  of  this  towering  egotism,  he  was  blind  to 
every  other  interest  When  he  suspected  his  patron  Lord  Berke- 
ley, and  Berkeley's  secretary,  Bushe,  of  playing  false  to  him  in  the 
matter  of  a  clerical  presentation,  he  left  their  presence  in  a  fury, 
crying — "  God  confound  you  both  for  a  couple  of  scoundrels  ! " 
When  his  butler,  who  copied  the  Drapier  Letters,  seemed  to  pre- 
sume upon  his  knowledge  of  the  terrible  secret,  he  dismissed  the 
man  with  "  Do  the  worst  you  dare,  sir ! " — an  infuriated  braving 
of  consequences  which  it  would  be  hard  to  parallel 

Opiniojis. — Macaulay  brands  our  author  as  "  an  apostate  politi- 
cian." He  coquetted  with  the  Whigs,  it  is  said,  and  went  over  to 
the  Tories  when  the  Whig  leaders  showed  an  imperfect  respect  for 
his  powers.  It  is  not  pretended  that  he  ever  wrote  for  the  Whigs, 
or  ever  received  favours  from  them.  In  his  choice  of  a  party  he 
probably  was  determined  not  a  little  by  personal  feelings  and  his 
natural  love  of  opposition. 

His  religious  sincerity  has  been  questioned.  The  presumptions 
are  drawn  solely  from  the  satirical  and  gross  tone  of  his  writings. 
Macaulay  terms  him  "a  ribald  priest"  Against  the  presumptions 
thus  derived  is  the  fact  that  he  is  often  sarcastic  with  disbelievers 
in  Christianity.  His  '  Tale  of  a  Tub '  supports  the  Church  of 
England  against  Papist  and  Presbyterian, 


JONATHAN    SWIFT.  365 

We  may  quote  one  or  two  of  his  "  Thoughts  on  various  sub- 
jects  "  :— 

"  We  have  just  enough  religion  to  make  us  hate,  but  not  enough  to  make 
us  love,  one  another." 

"  When  we  desire  or  solicit  anything,  our  minds  run  wholly  on  the  good 
side  or  circumstances  of  it;  when  it  is  obtained,  our  mi  mis  run  wholly  on 
the  bad  side." 

"  The  stoical  scheme  of  supplying  our  wants  by  lopping  off  our  desires,  is 
like  cutting  off  our  feet  when  we  want  shoes." 

"The  latter  part  of  a  wise  man's  life  is  taken  up  in  curing  the  follies, 
prejudices,  and  false  opinions  he  had  contracted  in  the  former." 

"  All  fits  of  pleasure  are  balanced  by  an  equal  degree  of  pain  or  languor  ; 
it  is  like  spending  this  year  part  of  next  year's  revenue. " 

"  Would  a  writer  know  how  to  behave  himself  with  relation  to  posterity, 
let  him  consider  in  old  books  what  he  finds  that  he  is  glad  to  know. " 

"  A  very  few  men,  properly  speaking,  live  at  present,  but  are  providing 
to  live  another  time. 

"  Matrimony  has  many  children ;  Repentance,  Discord,  Poverty,  Jealousy, 
Sickness,  Spleen,  Loathing,"  &c. 

In  his  letter  to  a  Young  Clergyman,  he  gives  the  following  advice: 

14 1  should  likewise  have  been  glad  if  you  had  applied  yourself  a  little 
more  to  the  study  of  the  English  language  than  I  fear  you  have  done  ;  the 
neglect  whereof  is  one  of  the  most  general  defects  among  the  scholars  ot  this 
kingdom,  who  seem  not  to  have  the  least  conception  of  a  style,  but  run  on 
in  a  flat  kind  of  phraseology,  often  mingled  with  barbarous  terms  and  ex- 
pressions peculiar  to  the  nation.  .  .  .  Proper  words  in  proper  places 
make  the  true  definition  of  a  style." 

ELEMENTS   OF   STYLE, 

Vocabulary. — Swift's  mastery  of  the  language  for  purposes  of 
ridicule  is  universally  allowed  to  be  unsurpassed.  His  range  is 
indeed  somewhat  too  wide  for  ordinary  tastes ;  in  the  process  of 
"debasing  and  defiling,"  he  sometimes  condescends  to  use  the 
language  of  the  brothel  The  propensity  to  shock  decorum  cost 
him  the  favour  of  Queen  Anne  and  a  bishopric.  « 

His  diction  is  praised  for  its  grammatical  purity.  We  have  just 
seen  that  he  was  particular  about  not  using  barbarous  terms. 
"  He  studied  purity ;  and  though  perhaps  all  his  strictures "  [his 
syntax]  "are  not  exact,  yet  it  is  not  often  that  solecisms  can  be 
found ;  and  whoever  depends  on  his  authority,  may  generally  con- 
clude himself  safe." 

Sentences  and  Paragraphs. — In  point  of  syntax,  our  author  is 
so  much  more  correct  than  any  writer  before  Johnson  that  he 
sometimes  gets  the  credit  of  establishing  modern  grammar.  Doubt- 
less he  profited  greatly  by  his  residence  with  the  finically  studious 
Temple.  If  his  syntax  is  more  uniformly  correct  than  Temple's, 


366  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

he  certainly  owes  to  Temple  the  habit  of  being  particular  in  this 
matter.  We  can  distinctly  trace  his  master's  influence  in  the 
finished  compacting  of  his  sentences. 

It  is  matter  of  praise  that  no  other  peculiarity  calls  for  special 
remark.  He  is  neither  strikingly  periodic,  nor  strikingly  loose, 
nor  strikingly  pointed.  His  education  under  Temple  taught  him 
the  period  and  point;  his  natural  love  of  simplicity  kept  him 
from  pushing  these  forms  to  an  extreme.  The  consequence  is, 
that  the  reader's  attention  is  not  specially  drawn  to  any  one  form, 
which  is  so  far  the  pert' ecti<  >n  of  sentence  style.  Farther,  with  his 
natural  clearness,  he  is  fairly  attentive  to  the  placing  of  words,  and 
to  the  unity  of  his  sentences. 

From  Temple  also  he  learned  to  study  method,  both  in  the 
general  arrangement  of  a  discourse  and  in  the  disposition  of  para- 
graphs. Almost  vehemently  anxious  to  be  followed  and  under- 
stood, he  is  explicit  in  referring  us  to  what  has  been  said,  \vhat  is 
to  come,  and  what  is  the  connection  of  one  thing  with  another. 

One  of  his  paragraph  arts  deserves  to  be  exemplified.  He  often, 
but  not  obtrusively  often,  reserves  a  telling  point  for  the  end. 
This  art  is  seen  in  the  three  following  paragraphs  from  his  letter 
of  advice  to  a  Young  Lady  on  her  marriage  : — 

"  I  must  likewise  warn  you  strictly  against  the  least  degree  of  fondness  to 
your  husband  before  any  witness  whatsoever,  even  before  your  nearest  rela- 
tions, or  the  very  maids  of  your  chamber.  This  proceeding  is  so  exceeding 
odious  and  disgustful  to  all  who  have  either  good  breeding  or  good  sense, 
that  they  assign  two  very  unamiable  reasons  for  it ;  the  one  is  gross  hypoc- 
risy, and  the  other  has  too  bad  a  name  to  mention.  If  there  is  any  differ- 
ence to  be  made,  your  husband  is  the  lowest  person  in  company  either  at 
home  or  abroad,  and  every  gentleman  present  has  a  better  claim  to  all  marks 
of  civility  and  distinction  from  you.  Conceal  your  esteem  and  love  in  your 
own  breast,  and  reserve  your  kind  looks  and  language  for  private  hours ; 
which  are  so  many  in  the  four-and-twenty,  that  they  will  afford  time  to 
employ  a  passion  as  exalted  as  any  that  was  ever  described  in  a  French 
romance. 

"  Upon  this  hesid  I  should  likewise  advise  you  to  differ  in  practice  from 
those  ladies  who  affect  abundance  of  uneasiness  while  their  husbands  are 
abroad ;  «tart  with  every  knock  at  the  door,  and  ring  the  bell  incessantly 
for  the  servants  to  let  in  their  master ;  will  not  eat  a  bit  of  dinner  or  supper 
if  the  husband  happens  to  stay  out ;  and  receive  him  at  his  return  with  sucn 
a  medley  of  chiding  and  kindness,  and  catechising  him  where  he  has  been, 
that  a  shrew  from  Billingsgate  would  be  a  more  easy  and  eligible  companion. 

"  Of  the  same  leaven  are  those  wives  who,  when  their  husbands  are  gone  a 
journey,  must  have  a  letter  every  post,  upon  pain  of  fits  and  hysterics  ;  and 
a  day  must  be  fixed  for  their  return  home,  without  the  least  allowance  for 
business,  or  sickness,  or  accidents,  or  weather  ;  upon  which  I  can  only  say 
that  in  my  observation  those  ladies  who  are  apt  to  make  the  greatest  chatter 
on  such  occasions,  woTild  liberally  have  paid  a  messenger  for  bringing  them 
news  that  their  husbands  had  broken  their  necks  on  the  road." 

Figures  of  Speech — Similitudes. — No  general  statement  can  be 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  367 

made  regarding  our  author's  use  of  figures  of  similarity.  Some  of 
his  writings  are  very  plain,  and  some  of  them  are  very  figurative. 
Setting  aside  '  Gulliver's  Travels,'  which  affects  the  blunt  diction 
of  a  seaf earing  captain,  and  not  forgetting  that  the  work  as  a  whole 
is  one  sustained  similitude,  we  may  say  that  when  he  writes 
seriously  his  language  is  simple,  unadorned,  and  designed  above 
everything  to  convey  his  meaning  directly ;  and  that  when  he 
writes  in  a  spirit  of  ridicule  he  gives  free  play  to  his  fancy.1  Even 
this  needs  modification.  His  gravest  didactic  is  enlivened  by 
strong  and  apt  similes  and  metaphors.  Nothing  could  be  more 
absurd  than  the  idea  that  he  never  uses  metaphors.  It  is  said  to 
be  a  boast  of  his  own  ;  if  so,  he  must  have  meant  by  metaphors — 
euphemisms  for  "nasty  ideas."  In  that  quarter  he  always  calls  a 
spade  a  spade. 

One  thing  is  very  remarkable  and  characteristic  in  his  simili- 
tudes; they  never  elevate  a  subject,  except  in  irony.  On  the 
other  hand,  they  frequently  debase,  and  that  to  no  ordinary  depth. 
His  allusions  are  often  extremely  gross. 

A  quotation  or  two  will  illustrate  the  character  of  his  simili- 
tudes. The  first  is  on  the  worship  of  Clothes,  which  Carlyle 
acknowledges  as  a  "dim  anticipation"  of  his  Philosophy: — 

"  The  worshippers  of  this  deity  had  also  a  system  of  their  belief,  which 
seemed  to  turn  upon  the  following  fundamentals.  They  held  the  universe 
to  be  a  large  suit  of  clothes,  which  invests  everything :  that  the  earth  is 
invested  by  the  air  ;  the  air  is  invested  by  the  stars,  and  the  stars  are  in- 
vested by  the  primum  mobile.  Look  upon  this  globe  of  earth,  you  will  find 
it  to  be  a  very  complete  and  fashionable  dress.  What  is  that  which  some 
call  land,  but  a  fine  coat  faced  with  green  ?  or  the  sea,  but  a  waistcoat  of 
water  tabby  I  Proceed  to  the  particular  works  of  the  creation,  you  will  find 
how  curious  a  journeyman  Nature  has  been  to  trim  up  the  vegetable  beaux; 
observe  how  sparkish  a  periwig  adorns  the  head  of  a  beech,  and  what  a  fine 
doublet  of  satin  is  worn  by  the  birch.  To  conclude  from  all,  what  is  man 
himself  but  a  microcoat,  or  rather  a  complete  suit  of  clothes  with  all  its 
trimmings  T  As  to  his  body  there  can  be  no  dispute  ;  but  examine  even  the 
requirements  of  his  mind,  you  will  find  them  all  contribute  in  their  order 
towards  furnishing  out  an  exact  dress  :  to  instance  no  more  ;  is  not  religion 
a  cloak,  honesty  a  pair  of  shoes  worn  out  in  the  dirt,  self-love  a  surtout, 
vanity  a  shirt,  and  conscience  a  pair  of  breeches,  which,  though  a  cover," 
Ac. 

' '  The  most  accomplished  way  of  using  books  at  present  is  twofold :  either, 
first,  to  serve  them  as  some  men  do  lords,  learn  their  titles  exactly,  and 
then  brag  of  their  acquaintance  ;  or,  secondly,  which  is  indeed  the  choicer, 
the  profounder,  and  politer  method,  to  get  a  thorough  insight  into  the  in- 
dex, by  which  the  whole  book  is  governed  and  turned,  like  fishes  by  the 
tail.  For  to  enter  the  palace  of  learning  at  the  great  gate  requires  an  ex- 
pense of  time  and  forms  ;  therefore  men  of  much  haste  and  little  ceremony 


1  Dr  Johnson  places  the  '  Tale  of  a  Tub '  by  itself  for  "  copiousness  of  image* 
and  vivacity  of  diction  ; "  but  others  of  his  ironical  pieces  are  of  the  same  ohar* 
acter.  See  the  "  Letter  to  a  Young  Poet" 


368  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

are  content  to  get  in  by  the  back-door.  For  the  arts  are  all  in  a  fl}ing 
march,  and  therefore  more  easily  subdued  by  attacking  them  in  the  rear. 
Thus  physicians  discover  the  state  of  the  whole  body,  by  consulting  only 
what  conies  from  behind.  Thus  men  catch  knowledge  by  throwing  their 
wit  on  the  posteriors  of  a  book,  as  boys  do  sparrows,  with  flinging  salt  upon 
their  tails.  Thus  human  life  is  best  understood  by  the  wise  man's  rule  of 
always  regarding  the  end. " 

"  To  my  certain  knowledge,  some  of  our  greatest  wits  in  your  poetical 
way  have  not  as  much  real  learning  as  would  cover  sixpence  in  the  bottom 
of  a  basin ;  nor  do  I  think  the  worse  of  them  ;  for,  to  speak  my  private 
opinion,  I  am  for  every  man's  working  upon  his  own  materials,  and  produc- 
ing only  what  he  can  find  within  himself,  which  is  commonly  a  better  stock 
than  the  owner  knows  it  to  be.  I  think  flowers  of  wit  ought  to  spring,  aa 
those  in  a  garden  do,  from  their  own  root  and  stem,  without  foreign  assist- 
ance.  I  would  have  a  man's  wit  rather  like  a  fountain,  that  feeds  itselJ 
invisibly,  than  a  river,  that  is  supplied  by  several  streams  from  abroad. 

"  Or  if  it  be  necessary,  as  the  case  is  with  some  barren  wits,  to  take  in  the 
thoughts  of  others  in  order  to  draw  forth  their  own,  as  dry  pumps  will  not 
play  till  water  is  thrown  into  them  ;  in  that  necessity,  I  would  recommend 
some  of  the  approved  standard  authors  of  antiquity  for  your  perusal  as  a 
poet  ami  a  wit,  because  maggots  being  what  you  look  for,  as  monkeys  do 
for  vermin  in  their  keepers'  heads,  you  will  find  they  abound  in  good  old 
authors,  as  in  rich  old  cheese,  not  in  the  new;  and  for  that  reason  you  must 
have  the  classics,  especially  the  worm-eaten  of  them,  often  in  your  hands." 

Allegory.—  The  *  Tale  of  a  Tub '  and  '  Gulliver's  Travels '  are  the 
two  most  finished  allegories  in  our  language.  Perhaps  greater 
constructive  skill  is  shown  in  the  Tale  than  in  the  Travels.  The 
Dean  is  said  to  have  exclaimed  in  his  old  age,  "  What  a  genius  I 
had  when  I  wrote  that  book  ! "  In  the  Travels  he  has  no  fixed 
order  to  observe,  and  can  introduce  his  satirical  allusions  when  and 
where  he  pleases ;  but  in  the  Tale  he  undertakes  to  allegorise  a 
history.  A  father  dies  leaving  three  sons,  Peter,  Martin,  and  Jack 
(Popery,  Episcopalianism,  and  Presbyteriariism,  represented  by  the 
apostle  Peter,  Martin  Luther,  and  Jack  Calvin).'  He  has  no  great 
property  to  bequeath,  so  he  bequeaths  them  each  a  coat  (a  system 
of  worship),  with  a  body  of  directions  how  to  preserve  it  This 
will  of  his  represents  the  Bible.  The  three  sons  soon  fall  into  the 
ways  of  the  world,  and  overlay  their  coats  with  all  the  fashionable 
trimmings — at  first  evading  the  will  by  ingenious  interpretations, 
but  finally  locking  it  up  and  never  referring  to  it.  By-and-by 
Martin  and  Jack  have  thoughts  of  reforming ;  steal  a  copy  of  the 
will ;  and  are  kicked  our,  of  doors  by  Peter.  They  then  reform  in 
earnest,  Martin  cautiously,  Jack  impetuously :  Martin  picking  off 
the  adventitious  gold-lace,  silver  fringes,  flame-coloured  lining,  <fec., 
carefully,  so  as  not  to  injure  the  garment ;  Jack  tearing  off  these 
ornaments  with  such  violence  as  to  leave  his  coat  in  tatters.  Jack 
quarrels  with  Martin  for  his  want  of  zeal,  separates  from  him  in  a 
rage,  runs  mad,  and  sets  up  all  kinds  of  strange  doctrine.  [The 


JONATHAN   S\VIFT.  369 

bias  of  the  allegory,  it  may  be  remarked,  is  strongly  in  favour  of 
the  English  Church.] 

One  of  the  most  ingenious,  and  at  the  same  time  one  of  the 
coarsest  chapters,  is  the  account  of  Jack's  doctrine  of  ^Eolism 
(from  ^Eolus,  the  god  of  wind).  It  is  a  satire  on  the  Puritan 
belief  in  the  special  inspiration  of  preachers  by  the  Holy  Ghost. 
The  beginning  is  an  example  of  his  ingenuity  in  bringing  scat- 
tered particulars  under  a  common  idea : — 

"  The  learned  ^Eolists  maintain  the  original  cause  of  all  things  to  be  wind, 
from  which  principle  this  whole  universe  was  at  first  produced,  and  into 
which  it  must  at  last  be  resolved ;  that  the  same  breath  which  had  kindled 
and  blew  up  the  flame  of  nature,  should  one  day  blow  it  out.  This  is  what 
the  adepti  understand  by  their  anima  mundi;  that  is  to  say,  the  spirit,  or 
breath,  or  wind  oi'  the  world;  for,  examine  the  whole  system  by  the  par- 
ticulars of  nature,  and  you  will  find  it  not  to  be  disputed.  For  whether  you 
please  to  call  the  forma  informans  of  man  by  the  name  of  spiritus,  animux, 
afflatus,  or  anima ;  what  are  all  these  but  several  appellations  for  wind, 
which  is  the  ruling  element  in  every  compound,  and  into  which  they  all 
resolve  upon  their  corruption  ?  Farther,  what  is  life  itself  but,  as  it  is  com- 
monly called,  the  breath  of  our  nostrils  ?  whence  it  is  very  justly  observed 
by  naturalists,  that  wind  still  continues  oi  great  emolument  in  certain  mys- 
teries not  to  be  named,"  &c. 

The  following  seems  intended  for  an  allegorical  description  of 
Qeneral  Assemblies  among  the  Presbyterians : — 

"  At  certain  seasons  of  the  year  you  might  behold  the  priests  among  them 
in  vast  numbers,  with  their  mouths  gaping  wide  against  a  storm.  At  other 
times  were  to  be  seen  several  hundreds  linked  together  in  a  circular  chain, 
with  every  man  a  pair  of  bellows  applied  to  his  neighbour's  breech,  by  which 
they  blew  up  each  other  to  the  size  of  a  tun  ;  and  for  that  reason,  with  givnt 
propriety  of  speech,  did  usually  call  their  bodies  their  vessels.  When,  by 
these  and  the  like  performances,  they  were  grown  sufficiently  replete,  they 
would  immediately  depart,  and  disembogue,  for  the  public  good,  a  plentiful 
share  of  their  acquirements  into  their  disciples'  chaps." 

Irony. — Of  this  art  Swift  is  a  consummate  master.  The  best- 
known  specimens  of  his  skill  are — '  An  Argument  to  prove  that 
the  abolishing  of  Christianity  in  England  may,  as  things  now 
stand,  be  attended  with  some  inconveniences,  and  perhaps  not 
produce  those  many  good  effects  proposed  thereby;'  and  'A 
Modest  Proposal  for  preventing  the  children  of  poor  people  in 
Ireland  from  being  a  burden  to  their  parents  or  country,  and  for 
making  them  beneficial  to  the  public.'  As  compared  with  Defoe's 
irony,  the  wit  of  these  pieces  is  more  subtle  and  surprising.  The 
opening  of  the  "Argument"  is  inimitably  happy;  he  affects  to  be 
in  a  minority,  and  apologises  for  venturing  to  oppose  the  general 
opinion : — 

"  I  am  very  sensible  what  a  weakness  and  presumption  it  is  to  reason 
against  the  general  humour  and  disposition  of'  the  world.  I  remember  it 
was,  with  great  justice  aud  due  regard  to  the  freedom  both  of  the  public  and 

'2  A 


370  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

the  press,  forbidden  upon  several  penalties  to  write  or  discourse,  or  lay 
wagers  against  the  Union  even  before  it  was  confirmed  by  Parliament ;  be- 
cause  that  was  looked  upon  as  a  design  to  oppose  the  current  of  the  people, 
which,  besides  the  folly  of  it,  is  a  manifest  breach  of  the  fundamental  law 
that  makes  this  majority  of  opinion  the  voice  of  God.  In  like  manner,  and 
for  the  very  same  reasons,  it  may  perhaps  be  neither  safe  nor  prudent  to 
argue  against  the  abolishing  of  Christianity  at  a  juncture  when  all  parties 
appear  so  unanimously  determined  upon  the  point,  as  we  cannot  but  allow 
from  their  actions,  their  discourses,  and  their  writings.  However,  I  know 
not  how,  whether  from  the  affectation  of  singularity,  or  the  perverseness  of 
human  nature,  but  so  it  unhappily  falls  out,  that  1  cannot  be  entirely  of  this 
opinion.  Nay,  though  1  were  sure  an  order  were  issued  for  my  immediate 
prosecution  by  the  Attorney-General,  I  should  still  confess  that,  in  the  pres- 
ent posture  of  our  affairs,  at  home  or  abroad,  I  do  not  yet  see  the  absolute 
necessity  of  extirpating  the  Christian  religion  from  among  us. 

"This  perhaps  may  appear  too  great  a  paradox  even  for  our  wise  and 
paradoxical  age  to  endure  ;  therefore  I  shall  handle  it  with  all  tenderness, 
and  with  the  utmost  deference  to  that  great  and  profound  majority  which  is 
of  another  sentiment. 

•'  Every  candid  render  will  easily  understand  my  discourse  to  be  intended 
only  in  defence  of  nominal  Christianity  ;  the  other  having  been  for  some 
time  wholly  laid  aside  by  general  consent  as  utterly  inconsistent  with  our 
present  schemes  of  wealth  and  power." 

In  his  "Modest  Proposal"  about  the  Irish  children,  he  begins 
by  a  description  of  the  miseries  of  over-population,  reminds  us  of 
"  the  prodigious  number  of  children  in  the  arms,  or  on  the  backs, 
or  at  the  heels  of  their  mothers,"  and  declares  that — 

"Whoever  could  find  out,  a  fair,  cheap,  and  easy  method  of  making  these 
children  sound  useful  members  of  the  Commonwealth,  would  deserve  so  well 
of  the  public  as  to  have  his  statue  set  up  for  a  preserver  of  the  nation." 

He  then  puts  in  his  claim  to  the  distinction  of  such  a  discovery. 
He  proposes — 

"  To  provide  for  them  in  such  a  manner  as,  instead  of  being  a  charge  upon 
their  parents  or  the  parish,  or  wanting  food  and  raiment  for  the  rest  of  their 
lives,  they  shall  on  the  contrary  contribute  to  the  feeding,  and  partly  to  the 
clothing,  of  many  thousands. " 

What,  then,  is  the  scheme  1 — 

"  I  have  been  assured  by  a  very  knowing  American  of  my  acquaintance  in 
London,  that  a  young  healthy  child,  well  nursed,  is,  at  a  year  old,  a  most 
delicious,  nourishing,  and  wholesome  food,  whether  stewed,  roasted,  baked, 
or  boiled  ;  and  I  make  no  doubt  that  it  will  equally  serve  in  a  fricassee  or  a 
ragout. 

"  I  do  therefore  humbly  offer  it  to  public  consideration,  that  of  the 
120,000  children  already  computed,  20,000  may  be  reserved  for  breed, 
whereof  only  one-fourth  part  to  be  males,  which  is  more  than  we  allow  to 
sheep,  black  cattle,  or  swine  ;  and  my  reason  is,  that  these  children  are 
belilom  the  fruits  of  marriage,  a  circumstance  not  much  regarded  by  our 
savages,  therefore  one  mule  will  be  sufficient  to  serve  four  females.  That 
the  remaining  100,000  may.  at  a  year  old,  be  offered  in  sale  to  the  persons 
of  quality  and  fortune  througii  the  kingdom,  always  advising  the  motliui  to 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  371 

let  them  suck  plentifully  in  the  l:<st  month,  so  as  to  render  them  plump  and 
fat  tor  a  good  table.  A  child  will  ninke  two  dishes  at  an  entertainment  foi 
friends  ;  and  when  the  family  dines  alone,  the  fore  or  hind  quarter  will  mako 
a  reasonable  dish,  and,  seasoned  with  a  little  pepper  or  salt,  will  be  verj 
good  boiled  on  the  fourth  day,  especially  in  winter. 

"  I  grant  this  food  will  be  somewhat  dear,  and  therefore  very  proper  for 
landlords,  who,  as  they  have  already  devoured  most  of  the  parents,  seem  to 
have  the  best  title  to  the  children. 

"  Those  who  are  more  thrifty  (as  I  must  confess  the  times  require),  may 
flay  the  carcase ;  the  skin  of  which,  artifically  dressed,  will  make  admirable 
gloves  for  ladies,  and  summer  boots  for  fine  gentlemen. 

"As  to  our  City  of  Dublin,  shambles  may  be  appointed  for  this  purpose  in 
the  most  convenient  parts  of  it,  and  butchers,  we  may  be  assured,  will  not 
be  wanting ;  although  I  rather  recommend  buying  the  children  alive,  then 
dressing  them  hot  from  the  knife,  as  we  do  roasting-pigs. " 

The  above  are  perhaps  the  more  horrible  details  of  this  horrible 
proposal  The  conclusion  is  a  very  fine  stroke  of  wit,  as  carrying 
out  the  consistency  of  the  irony  to  the  greatest  possible  height : — 

"  I  profess,  in  the  sincerity  of  my  heart,  that  I  have  not  the  least  personal 
interest  in  endeavouring  to  promote  this  necessary  work,  having  no  other 
motive  than  the  public  good  of  my  country,  by  advancing  our  trade,  provid- 
ing for  infants,  relieving  the  poor,  and  giving  some  pleasure  to  the  rich.  I 
have  no  children  by  which  I  can  propose  to  get  a  single  penny,  the  youngest 
being  nine  years  old,  and  my  wile  past  child-bearing." 


QUALITIES   OF  STYLE. 

Simplicity. — "His  delight  was  in  simplicity.  His  style  was 
well  suited  to  his  thoughts,  which  are  never  subtilised  by  nice 
disquisitions,  decorated  by  sparkling  conceits,  elevated  by  am- 
bitious sentences,  or  variegated  by  far-sought  learning.  .  .  . 
He  always  understands  himself,  and  his  readers  always  under- 
stand him :  the  peruser  of  Swift  wants  little  previous  knowledge ; 
it  will  be  sufficient  that  he  is  acquainted  with  common  words  and 
common  things ;  he  is  neither  required  to  mount  elevations  nor  to 
explore  profundities ;  his  passage  is  always  on  a  level,  along  solid 
ground,  without  asperities,  without  obstruction."  l 

The  Drapier  Letters  were  written  in  peculiarly  familiar  style. 
Whoever  wishes  to  model  upon  Swift  in  this  respect,  must  not  for- 
get that  his  simplicity  verges  on  coarseness. 

Clearness. — It  is  not  always  Swift's  desire  to  make  his  meaning 
distinct.  One  of  his  arts  is  to  hide  it  away  under  similitudes. 
When  he  does  wish  to  be  beyond  possibility  of  mistake,  he  knows 
how  to  accomplish  the  object.  He  does  not  deal  with  subjects 
where  single  words  are  much  open  to  different  interpretations  by 
different  readers,  and  so  has  not  much  room  for  showing  his  skill 
in  preventing  ambiguity.  But  he  is  careful  to  make  his  words  fit 

1  Johnson,  Life  of  Swift 


372  FROM   I7u0  TO   1730. 

close  to  his  ideas,  and  often  brings  out  his  meaning  sharply,  by 
contrasting  it  with  what  he  does  not  mean. 

Strength. — His  diction  is  emphatic  and  copious,  and  the  intense 
force  of  his  satire  is  unsurpassed.  Johnson's  saying,  that  "he 
pays  no  court  to  the  passions,  he  excites  neither  surprise  nor  ad- 
miration,"1 is  a  hasty  judgment  that  needs  qualification.  If  we 
accept  it,  we  must  understand  by  passion — sublimity ;  and  by  sur- 
prise and  admiration,  the  elevation  of  sublimity.  Nothing  could 
l>e  more  surprising  or  impressive  than  the  flashes  of  Swift's  wit; 
:n id  of  passion,  in  one  sense,  there  is  enough,  and  more  than  enough, 
in  the  Drapier's  Letters  : — 

"  Good  God  !  who  are  this  wretch's  advisers?  Who  are  his  supporters, 
abettors,  encouragers,  or  sharers  ?  Mr  Wood  will  oblige  me  to  take  five- 
pence-halfpenny  of  his  brass  in  every  payment ;  and  I  will  shoot  Mr  Wood 
and  his  deputies  through  the  head,  like  highwaymen  or  .housebreakers,  if 
they  dare  to  force  one  farthing  of  their  coin  on  me  in  the  payment  of  £100. 
It  is  no  loss  of  honour  to  submit  to  the  lion  ;  but  who,  with  the  figure  of  a 
man,  can  think  Avith  patience  of  being  devoured  alive  by  a  rat  ?  He  has 
laid  a  tax  upon  the  people  of  Ireland  of  17s.  at  least  in  the  pound  ;  a  tax,  I 
say,  not  only  upon  lands,  but  interest-money,  goods,  manufactures,  the  hire 
of  handicraftsmen,  labourers,  and  servants. 

'*  Shopkeepers,  look  to  yourselves  ! "  &c. 

Pathos. — Swift  had  such  a  hatred  of  insincere  sentiment,  and 
such  a  tendency  to  believe  every  open  profession  of  sentiment  to 
be  insincere,  that  he  seldom,  if  ever,  wrote  a  word  either  of  affec- 
tion or  of  compassion  in  any  work  intended  for  publication.  The 
only  exceptions  that  I  have  remarked  are  in  the  Drapier  Letters, 
where  he  expresses  an  indignant  pity  for  the  sufferings  of  Ireland, 
and  makes  a  lofty  profession  of  the  disinterestedness  of  his  public 
spirit  The  Journal  to  Stella  was  not  intended  for  the  public  eye. 
There  he  indulges  without  constraint  in  infantine  expressions  of 
fondness:  Stella  is  "sirrah  Stella,"  " Stellakins,"  "rogue  Stella," 
"pretty  Stella,"  "MD,"  "little  MD,"  "dearest  MD,"  "dear, 
roguish,  impudent,  pretty  MD." 

"How  now,  sirrah,  must  I  write  in  a  morning  to  your  impudence  I 

Stay  till  night 
And  then  I'll  write 
In  black  and  white 
By  candle-light 
Of  wax  so  bright 
It  helps  the  sight 
A  bite,  a  bite  I 

Marry  come  up,  Mrs  Boldface. " 


*  Sir  W.  Scott  is  more  exact—  "  He  never  attempted  any  species  of  composition 
In  winch  either  the  sublime  or  the  pathetic  were  required  of  him.  But  in  every 
department  of  poetry  where  wit  is  necessary,  he  displayed,  as  the  subject  chanced 
to  require,  either  the  blasting  lightning  of  satire,  or  the  lambent  and  meteor- 
like  coruscations  of  frolicsome  humour." 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  373 

The  Ludicrous. — He  is  pre-eminently  a  satirist ;  nobody  can  pre- 
tend to  dispute  his  title  of  the  prince  of  English  Satirists. 

In  the  ludicrous  degradation  of  his  victims,  he  makes  no  affec- 
tation of  kindliness,  and  parades  rather  than  disguises  his  con- 
tempt. Readers  that  are  not  subdued  by  the  charms  of  his  wit 
pronounce  him  coarse,  insolent,  unfeeling,  and  turn  from  his  pages 
with  aversion.  This  is  one  difference  between  him  and  Addison ; 
they  ayree  in  being  derisive  rather  than  humorous. 

From  Addison  he  differs  still  more  in  the  extent  and  force  of 
his  satire.  Addison  has  a  few  pet  objects  of  ridicule.  Swift 
exempts  from  his  ridicule  no  profession,  no  foible,  hardly  any 
institution,  hardly  any  character.  Clergymen,  lawyers,  doctors, 
authors,  politicians,  wits,  demonstrative  affection,  coxcombry,  the 
behaviour  of  ladies,  bad  manners,  Popery,  Presbyterianism,  educjv- 
tion,  and,  one  may  say  in  general,  every  individual  that  crosses 
his  opinions — all  come  in  for  a  cut  of  his  stinging  lash. 

There  are  some  fair  specimens  of  insulting  sarcasm  among  his 
'  Thoughts  on  various  subjects ' : — 

"Query,  whether  churches  are  not  dormitories  of  the  living  as  well  as  of 
the  dead  I " 

"Apollo  was  held  the  god  of  physic  and  sender  of  diseases.  Both  were 
originally  the  same  trade,  and  still  continue." 

"The  two  maxims  of  any  great  man  at  court  are,  always  to  keep  his 
countenance,  and  never  to  keep  his  word." 

"  A  very  little  wit  is  valued  in  a  woman,  as  we  are  pleased  with  a  few 
words  spoken  plain  by  a  parrot." 

"A  nice  man  is  a  man  of  nasty  ideas." 

"  If  the  men  of  wit  and  genius  would  resolve  never  to  complain  in  their 
works  of  critics  and  detractors,  the  next  age  would  not  know  that  they  ever 
had  any. " 

His  advice  "to  a  very  young  lady  on  her  marriage"  is  an  ex- 
cellent specimen  of  rough  sarcastic  counsel,  wholesome,  but  not  in 
the  slightest  accommodated  to  the  palate.  See  p.  366. 

A  very  favourite  stroke  at  the  free-thinkers  and  the  wits  is 
to  set  forth  ironically  the  advantages  of  the  Church  and  of 
Christianity : — 

"It  is  objected,  as  a  very  absurd,  ridiculous  custom,  that  a  set  of  men 
should  be  suffered,  much  less  employed  and  hired,  to  bawl  one  day  in  seven 
against  the  lawfulness  of  those  methods  most  in  use  towards  the  pursuit  of 
greatness,  riches,  and  pleasure,  which  are  the  constant  practice  of  all  men 
alive  on  the  other  six.  But  the  objection  is,  I  think,  a  little  unworthy  of 
BO  refined  an  age  as  ours.  Let  us  argue  this  matter  calmly  :  I  appeal  to  the 
breast  of  any  polite  free-thinker,  whether,  in  the  pursuit  of  gratifying  a 
predominant  passion,  he  has  not  always  felt  a  wonderful  incitement  by 
reflecting  that  it  was  a  thing  forbidden  ;  and  therefore  we  see,  in  order  to 
cultivate  this  taste,  the  wisdom  of  the  nation  has  taken  special  care  that  the 
ladies  should  be  furnished  with  prohibited  silks,  aiid  the  men  with  pro- 


374  FKOM   1700  TO   1730. 

hibited  wine.  And  indeed  it  were  to  be  wished  that  some  other  prohibi- 
tions were  promoted,  in  order  to  improve  the  pleasures  of  the  town ;  which, 
for  want  of  such  expedients,  begin  already,  as  I  am  told,  to  flag  and  grow 
languid,  giving  way  daily  to  cruel  inroads  from  the  spleen." 

He  is  dissatisfied  with  modern  education : — 

"From  frequently  reflecting  upon  the  course  and  method  of  educating 
youth  in  this  and  a  neighbouring  kingdom,  with  the  general  success  and 
consequence  thereof,  I  am  come  to  this  determination  ;  that  education  is 
always  the  worse  in  proportion  to  the  wealth  and  grandeur  of  the  parents  ; 
nor  do  I  doubt  in  the  least,  that  if  the  whole  world  were  now  under  the 
dominion  of  one  monarch  (provided  I  might  be  allowed  to  choose  where  he 
should  form  the  seat  of  his  empire),  the  only  son  and  heir  of  that  monarch 
would  be  the  worst  educated  mortal  that  ever  was  born  since  the  creation ; 
and  I  doubt  the  same  proportion  will  hold  through  all  degrees  and  titles, 
from  an  emperor  downwards  to  the  common  gentry." 

"Another  hindrance  to  good  education,  and  I  think  the  greatest  of  any, 
is  that  pernicious  custom  in  rich  and  noble  families,  of  entertaining  French 
tutors  in  their  houses.  These  wretched  pedagogues  are  enjoined  by  the 
father  to  take  special  care  that  the  boy  shall  be  perfect  in  his  French  ;  by 
the  mother,  that  master  must  not  walk  till  he  is  hot,  nor  be  suffered  to  play 
with  other  boys,  nor  be  wet  in  his  feet,  nor  daub  his  clothes,  and  to  see  the 
dancing-master  attends  constantly  and  does  his  duty ;  the  father  insists 
that  he  be  not  kept  too  long  poring  on  his  book,  because  he  is  subject  to 
sore  eyes,  and  of  a  weakly  constitution." 

In  his  treatise  on  good  manners,  he  is  very  contemptuous  about 
the  practice  of  duelling  : — 

"  I  should  be  exceedingly  sorry  to  find  the  legislature  make  any  new  laws 
against  the  practice  of  duelling ;  because  the  methods  are  easy  and  many  for 
a  wise  man  to  avoid  a  quarrel  with  honour,  or  engage  in  it  with  innocence. 
And  I  can  discover  no  political  evil  in  suffering  bullies,  sharpers,  and  rakes, 
to  rid  the  world  of  each  other  by  a  method  of  their  own,  where  the  law  has 
not  been  able  to  find  an  expedient." 

By  nature  extremely  impatient  of  whatever  was  troublesome,  he 
hated  over-civility.  One  of  his  Tatlers  is  a  coarse  exaggeration 
of  overdone  hospitality.  When  sneering  at  the  multiplication  of 
ceremonies,  he  relates  a  ridiculous  accident,  without  caring  to  con- 
ceal names : — 

"  Monsieur  Buys,  the  Dutch  envoy,  whose  politics  and  manners  were 
much  of  a  size,  brought  a  son  with  him,  about  thirteen  years  old,  to  a  great 
table  at  Court.  The  boy  and  his  father,  whatever  they  put  on  their  plates, 
they  first  offered  round  in  order  to  every  person  in  company ;  so  that  we 
could  not  get  a  minute's  quiet  during  the  whole  dinner.  At  last  their  two 
plates  happened  to  encounter,  and  with  so  much  violence  that,  being  china, 
they  broke  in  twenty  pieces,  and  stained  half  the  company  with  wet  sweet- 
meats and  cream." 

His  personal  sarcasms  are  very  contemptuous.  He  alludes  to 
Defoe  as  "the  fellow  that  was  pilloried,  I  forget  his  name."  He 
is  merciless  on  poor  John  Dennis  : — 


JONATHAN   SWIFT.  375 

"One  Dennis,  commonly  called  'the  critic,'  who  had  writ  a  threepenny 
pamphlet  against  the  power  of  France,  being  in  the  country,  and  hearing  of 
a  French  privateer  hovering  about  the  coast,  although  he  were  twenty  miles 
from  the  sea.  fled  to  town,  and  told  his  friends  they  need  not  wonder  at  his 
haste ;  for  the  King  of  France,  having  got  intelligence  where  he  was,  had 
sent  a  privateer  on  purpose  to  catch  him. " 

One  of  the  special  objects  of  his  pitiless  dislike  was  Bnrnet  the 
historian.  He  ridiculed  the  '  History  of  my  own  Times '  under 
the  allegory  of  the  '  Memoirs  of  P.  P.,  Clerk  of  this  Parish.' 
Swift's  copy  of  the  history  has  been  preserved;  the  marginal 
comments  are  good  specimens  of  the  peculiar  turn  of  his  wit 
I  quote  one  or  two  as  they  are  given  in  Collet's  'Relics  of 
Literature ' : — 

Preface,  p.  3.  Burnet. — "  Indeed,  the  peevishness,  the  ill-nature,  and 
the  ambition  of  many  clergymen,  have  sharpened  my  spirits  perhaps  too 
much  against  them  ;  so  I  warn  my  readers  to  take  all  that  I  say  on  those 
heads  with  some  grains  of  allowance."  Swift. — "  I  will  take  his  warning." 

P.  28.  Burnet. — "  The  Earl  of  Argyle  was  a  more  solemn  sort  of  man, 
grave  and  sober,  and  free  of  all  scandalous  vices."  Swift. — "  As  a  man  is 
free  of  a  corporation,  he  means." 

P.  5.  Burnet. — "  Upon  the  King's  death,  the  Scots  proclaimed  his  son 
king,  and  sent  over  Sir  George  Wincan,  that  married  my  great  aunt,  to 
treat  with  him  while  he  was  in  the  Isle  of  Jersey."  Svrift. — "  Was  that  the 
reason  why  he  was  sent  ?  " 

P.  163.  Burnet  (speaking  of  '  Paradise  Lost  ')• — "  It  was  esteemed  the 
beautifullest  and  perfectest  poem  that  ever  was  writ,  at  least  in  our  lan- 
guage." Surift. — "A  mistake  !  for  it  is  in  English," 


KINDS   OP   COMPOSITION. 

Persuasion. — Swift's  pamphlet  on  'The  Conduct  of  the  Allies' 
is  said  to  have  told  with  unexampled  effect;  to  have  revolution- 
ised public  feeling,  and  overturned  a  powerful  Ministry.  For  ten 
years,  in  union  with  Germany  and  Holland,  we  had  fought  against 
the  succession  of  a  French  prince  to  the  Spanish  throne ;  we.  had 
won  four  splendid  victories,  and  yet  seemed  in  no  hurry  to  make 
reasonable  overtures  of  peace.  Dazzled  by  Marlborough's  success, 
the  people  had  no  suspicion  that  the  war  was  protracted  to  fill  his 
pockets.  Swift's  pamphlet  changed  the  aspect  of  things  as  by 
enchantment ;  it  was  read  everywhere,  and  raised  popular  indig- 
nation to  such  a  height,  that,  within  a  year  after  its  appearance, 
a  new  Government  was  formed,  which  concluded  the  famous 
Treaty  of  Utrecht 

Johnson  thinks  that  "  the  efficacy  of  this  wonder-working  pam- 
phlet was  supplied  by  the  passions  of  its  readers ;  that  it  operated 
by  the  mere  weight  of  facts  with  a  very  little  assistance  from  the 
hand  that  produced  them."  But  the  art  of  the  pamphleteer  lay  in 
bringing  the  popular  passions  into  exerciser— in  picking  out,  and 


376  FROM    1700  TO   1730. 

showing  in  strong  lt<j;ht,  facts  that  were  escaping  general  notice — 
in  relieving  the  pulilic  from  the  fascination  of  military  success,  and 
fixing  their  eyes  on  the  other  side  of  the  picture. 

If  the  'Conduct  of  the  Allies'  gained  its  end  by  a  skilful  pres- 
entation of  facts  in  a  calm  statement,  the  Drapier  Letters  were 
performances  of  a  very  different  kind.  A  Mr  Wood,  a  large  owner 
of  mines,  had  obtained  from  Government  a  patent  for  issuing,  under 
certain  regulations,  a  copper  coinage  of  halfpence  for  Ireland.  In 
Ireland,  then  as  now,  there  was  strong  jealousy  of  England ;  and 
Swift,  striking  in  against  the  project,  took  full  advantage  of  the 
national  feeling.  The  need  of  a  copper  coinage  was  glaring  and 
urgent — he  could  say  nothing  on  that  score ;  but  he  represented 
that  the  Irish  Houses  of  Parliament  had  previously  requested  leave 
to  coin  and  issue  the  needful  money,  and  had  been  refused.  What 
was  refused  to  the  nobility  and  gentry  of  Ireland  had  been  granted 
to  this  man — "a mean  ordinary  man,  a  hardware  dealer."  Swift 
makes  no  attempt  to  argue  the  justice  of  the  proceeding.  He 
heaps  abuse  upon  Wood,1  asserts  against  him  audaciously  ground- 
less charges,  pictures  the  most  unreasonable  consequences  of  the 
measure,  and  pours  out  hot  appeals  to  the  passions  of  his  readers. 

The  following  quotations  illustrate  the  kind  of  reasoning  he 
used.  When  to  these  ludicrous  exaggerations  of  the  inconveni- 
ence of  exchange  the  simple  answer  was  made  that  nobody  would 
be  obliged  to  take  more  than  fivepence-halfpenny  in  copper,  Swift 
blustered  about  confining  the  liberty  of  the  subject  But  for  the 
strong  feeling  existing  against  England,  which  blinded  the  Irish 
to  every  consideration  of  reason,  the  Drapier  would  have  been 
laughed  at.  As  it  was,  had  the  Government  refused  to  give  way, 
his  violent  and  hot  exaggerations  would  have  raised  an  armed  re- 
bellion, and  his  apparent  patriotism  made  him  a  national  hero : — 

"  Suppose  you  go  to  an  alehouse  with  that  base  money,  and  the  landlord 
gives  you  a  quart  for  four  of  those  halfpence,  what  must  the  victualler  do  t 
'  his  brewer  will  not  be  paid  in  that  coin  ;  or,  if  the  brewer  should  be  such  a 
fool,  the  farmers  will  not  take  it  from  them  for  their  bere,  because  they  are 
bound  by  their  leases  to  pay  their  rent  in  good  and  lawful  money  of  Eng- 
land ;  which  this  is  not,  nor  of  Ireland  neither;  and  the  "squire  their  land- 
lord will  never  be  so  bewitched  to  take  such  trash  for  his  land ;  so  that  it 
roust  certainly  stop  somewhere  or  other ;  and  wherever  it  stops,  it  is  the 
same  thing,  and  we  are  all  undone." 

"  If  a  squire  has  a  mind  to  come  to  town  to  buy  clothes,  and  wine,  and 
spices,  for  himself  and  family,  or  perhaps  to  pass  the  winter  here,  he  must 
bring  with  him  live  or  six  horses  well  laden  with  sacks,  as  the  farmers  bring 
their  corn  ;  and  when  his  lady  comes  in  her  coach  to  our  shops,  it  must  be 
followed  by  a  car  loaded  with  Mr  Wood's  money.  And  I  hope  we  shall 
have  the  grace  to  take  it  for  no  more  than  it  is  worth." 

i  See  p.  37* 


JOSEPH  ADDISON.  377 

"And  let  me  in  the  next  place  apply  myself  particularly  to  you  who  are 
the  poorer  sort  of  tradesmen.  Perhaps  you  may  think  you  will  not  be  so 
great  losers  as  the  rich  if  these  halfpence  should  pass;  because  you  seldom 
see  any  silver,  and  your  customers  come  to  your  shops  or  stalls  with  nothing 
but  brass,  which  you  likewise  find  hard  to  be  got.  But  yon  may  take  my 
word,  whenever  this  money  gains  footing  among  you,  you  will  be  utterly 
undone.  If  you  carry  these  halfpence  to  a  shop  for  tobacco  or  brandy,  or 
any  other  thing  that  you  want,  the  shopkeeper  will  advance  his  goods 
accordingly,  or  else  he  must  break  and  leave  the  key  under  the  door.  '  Do 
you  think  I  will  sell  you  a  yard  of  tenpenny  stuff  for  twenty  of  Mr  Wood's 
halfpence!  no,  not  under  200  at  least;  neither  will  I  be  at  the  trouble  of 
counting,  but  weigh  them  in  a  lump.'  I  will  tell  you  one  thing  further, 
that  if  Mr  Wood's  project  should  take,  it  would  ruin  even  our  beggars  ;  for 
when  I  give  a  b'-g^ar  a  halfpenny,  it  will  quench  his  thirst,  or  go  a  good 
way  to  fill  his  belly  ;  but  the  twelfth  part  of  a  halfpenny  will  do  him  no 
more  service  than  if  I  should  give  him  three  plus  out  of  my  sleeve." 

JOSEPH  ADDISON,  1672-1719. 

Speaking  of  the  age  of  William  and  Anne,  Macaulay  say&— 
"  There  was,  perhaps,  never  a  time  at  which  the  rewards  of  liter- 
ary merit  were  so  splendid,  at  which  men  who  could  write  well 
found  such  easy  admittance  into  the  most  distinguished  society, 
and  to  the  highest  honours  of  the  State."  Nobody  profited  more 
than  Addison  by  this  accident  of  the  times.  His  abilities  were 
very  soon  recognised  by  the  Whig  leaders.  The  son  of  Lancelot 
Addison,  Rector  of  Lichfield,  educated  at  Charterhouse  and  Mag- 
dalen College,  Oxford,  he  was  dissuaded  from  his  design  of  enter- 
ing the  Church  by  Charles  Montagu,  afterwards  Earl  of  Halifax, 
who  procured  him  a  pension  from  King  William,  and  sent  him  to 
travel  in  France  and  Italy  (1699-1702).  Returning  to  England  on 
the  death  of  William,  which  had  stopped  his  pension,  he  gained 
some  reputation  by  a  poem  commemorating  the  victory  of  Blen- 
heim (1704);  and,  having  thus  proved  his  value  to  a  party,  was 
in  1705  made  Under-Secretary  of  State.  Thereafter  he  held 
various  political  offices :  was  appointed  Keeper  of  the  Records 
of  Ireland  in  1709;  Secretary  to  the  Regency  on  the  demise  of 
Queen  Anne  in  1714;  one  of  the  Lords  of  Trade  under  George 
1.  ;  one  of  the  Chief  Secretaries  of  State  in  1717.  From  these 
high  posts  he  drew  a  large  income,  while  he  had  considerable 
leisure  for  writing.  He  died  in  1719,  leaving  one  daughter  by 
the  Countess  Dowager  of  Warwick,  whom  he  had  married  three 
years  before,  and  who  added  little  to  his  comfort  while  he  was 
alive. 

Addison's  first  prose  composition,  his  'Dialogues  on  Medals,' 
was  written  during  his  Continental  travels.  In  1702  he  pub- 
lished an  account  of  his  travels  in  Italy,  remarkable  for  happy 
allusions  to  ancient  Roman  history  and  literature.  His  fame  as 
a  prose  writer  rests  on  his  contributions  to  periodical  papers — 


378  FROM   1700  TO  1730. 

the  'Tatler,'  the  '  Spectator,'  and  the  '  Guardian.'  The  '  Tatler  * 
was  commenced  on  April  12,  1709,  by  Sir  Richard  Steele,  under 
the  assumed  name  of  Isaac  Bickerstaff.  Addison,  who  was  then 
in  Ireland,  detected  the  author  by  a  passage  in  the  sixth  number, 
and  sent  his  first  ascertained  contribution  to  No.  20,  May  26.  The 
paper  appeared  three  times  a-week.  Addison  did  not  become  a 
regular  contributor  till  his  return  from  Ireland  in  September.  The 
last  number  of  the  'Tatler'  appeared  on  January  2,  1711.  On 
the  demise  of  the  '  Tatler,'  Steele  projected  the  '  Spectator,'  to  be 
issued  daily:  it  continued  from  March  i,  1711,  to  December  6, 
1712,  and  during  all  that  time  Addison  was  a  frequent  contrib- 
utor, writing  more  than  half  of  the  numbers.  The  '  Guardian,'  also 
a  daily  paper,  extended  from  March  12  to  October  i,  1713 ;  Addi- 
son's  contributions  were  chiefly  to  the  later  numbers.  In  1714 
came  out  what  is  known  as  the  Eighth  Volume  of  the  '  Spectator ' ; 
of  this  nearly  all  the  first  half  was  written  by  Addison. 

The  '  Tatler,'  the  '  Spectator,'  and  the  '  Guardian '  formally  ex- 
cluded politics ;  their  professed  purpose  was  to  discuss  the  fashions 
and  manners  of  society,  the  pulpit,  the  theatre,  the  opera,  and 
general  literature ;  in  short,  they  were  open  to  all  the  subjects 
now  discussed  in  the  '  Saturday  Review,'  the  '  Spectator,'  or  the 
'Examiner,'  except  politics.  In  this  respect  they  differed  from 
the  '  Review '  of  Defoe,  the  real  prototype  of  modern  periodicals. 
But  while  they  excluded  politics  in  form,  Addison,  as  we  shall  see, 
in  many  of  his  papers  was  in  no  small  degree  influenced  by  politi- 
cal prejudices. 

Besides  these  universally-known  performances,  Addison  wrote 
some  strictly  political  papers:  in  1707,  a  pamphlet  on  the  'Pres- 
ent State  of  the  War ' ;  the  '  Whig  Examiner,'  a  weekly  tract,  not 
carried  beyond  the  fifth  number;  the  'Trial  of  Count  Tariff,' a 
satire  on  the  commercial  treaty  of  Utrecht,  1713  ;  and  'The  Free- 
holder,' a  bi-weekly,  carried  through  55  numbers,  1715-16. 

Addison' s  personal  appearance  has  not  been  very  vividly  re- 
corded. Thackeray  speaks  of  "his  chiselled  features,  pure  and 
cold."  We  know  also  that  he  was  a  fair  man,  of  a  full  habit  of 
body,  soft  and  flabby  from  winebibbing  and  want  of  exercise. 
He  was  so  weakly  a  child  that  he  was  christened  on  the  day  of  his 
birth,  not  being  expected  to  live. 

The  most  general  characteristic  of  his  intellect  is  happily  ex- 
pressed by  Johnson — "  He  thinks  justly,  but  he  thinks  faintly." 
He  is  a  great  contrast  to  the  prolific  and  vigorous  Defoe.  Not 
only  had  he  little  spontaneous  activity  of  intellect,  little  impulsive- 
ness :  this  might  be  said  of  the  cautious  and  sober  Temple.  More 
than  this,  he  had  not  sufficient  constitutional  energy  to  be  equal 
to  the  mere  effort  requisite  for  forming  a  clear  and  profound  judg- 


JOSEPH  ADDISON.  379 

ment  on  any  question  of  difficulty.  With  his  languid  vitality,  he 
was  content  to  be  superficial.  He  had  naturally  a  fine  memory 
for  words,  and  was,  in  his  quiet  way,  an  accurate  observer  of  what 
passed  before  him.  His  chief  intellectual  exercise  was  the  stu  1y 
of  "  putting  things  " — whether  things  that  he  had  seen  and  heard, 
reflections  that  he  had  made  upon  them,  or  thoughts  that  he  had 
met  with  in  the  course  of  his  reading.  He  had  neither  scholarship 
nor  original  thought — "  a  fine  gentleman  living  upon  town,  not 
professing  any  deep  scholastic  knowledge  of  literature,"  and  em- 
ploying his  leisure  in  writing  elegant  periodical  articles.1 

Like  Cowley,  he  had  no  depth  of  sentiment  for  imagination  to 
work  upon.  Not  only  so,  but  he  was  deficient  in  constitutional 
power  of  enjoyment ;  he  was  by  nature  shy,  irritable,  and  captious, 
sitting  in  company  reserved  and  taciturn,  until  his  cups  had  raised 
him  to  the  point  of  geniality.  Even  his  panegyrist  Thackeray 
admits — "  I  do  not  think  Addison's  heart  melted  very  much,  or 
that  he  indulged  very  inordinately  in  the  '  vanity  of  grieving.' " 
"  This  great  man  was  also  one  of  the  lonely  ones  of  the  world." 
The  chief  emotion  that  he  cultivated  may  be  described  in  the 
words  of  Johnson  as  "  gay  malevolence  and  satirical  humour "  : 
the  malevolence  being  due  to  his  constitutional  incapacity  for 
enjoyment — to  ill-nature,  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  words ;  while 
the  gaiety  or  humour  arises  chiefly  from  the  delicate  elegance  of 
his  language,  and  the  writer's  pleasure  in  the  exercise  of  his  gift. 
His  essays  on  Milton  and  on  the  Pleasures  of  the  Imagination 
would  seem  to  show  that,  though  he  had  not  energy  to  write  with 
sublimity  himself,2  he  enjoyed  sublime  writing  when  it  was  pre- 
sented to  him ;  he  could  at  least  utter  the  formula  of  indolent 
admiration — "There  is  a  pleasure  in  what  is  great,  in  what  is 
beautiful,  and  in  what  is  new." 

Although  engaged  in  politics,  he  had  no  natural  gifts  for  active 

1  "With  reference  to  Addison  in  particular,  it  is  time  to  correct  the  popular 
notion  of  his  literary  character,  or  at  least  to  mark  it  by  severer  lines  of  distinc- 
tion.    It  is  already  pretty  well  known  that  Addison  had  no  very  intimate  ac- 
quaintance with  the  literature  of  his  own  country.    It  is  known,  also,  that  he  did 
not  think  such  an  acquaintance  any  ways  essential  to  the  character  of  an  elegant 
scholar  and  litterateur.     Quite  enough  he  found  it,  and  more  than  enough  for 
the  time  he  had  to  spare,  if  he  could  maintain  a  tolerable  familiarity  with  the 
foremost  Latin  poets,  and  a  very  slender  one  indeed  with  the  Grecian.    How 
slender,  we  can  see  in  his  Travels." — De  Quincey,  xv.  8. 

2  "  Though  Addison  generally  hated  the  impassioned,  and  shrank  from  it  as 
from  a  fearful  thing,  yet  this  was  when  it  combined  with  forms  of  life  and  fleshly 
realities  (as  in  dramatic  works),  but  not  when  it  combined  with  elder  forms  of 
eternal  abstractions.     Hence  he  did  not  read,  and  did  not  like,  Shakspeare — the 
music  was  here  too  rapid  and  lifelike  ;  but  he  sympathised  profoundly  with  the 
solemn  cathedral- chanting  of  Milton.     An  appeal  to  his  sympathies  which  ex- 
acted quick  changes  in  those  sympathies  he  could  not  meet,  but  a  more  station- 
ary key  of  solemnity  he  could." — De  Quincey,  vii.  56.     This  is  explained  by  hi* 
want  of  constitutional  energy,  and  consequent  incapability  of  supporting  ex- 
citement. 


380  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

lifa  He  could  not  have  made  his  own  position  ;  the  accident  of 
the  times  rendered  literary  service  valuable,  and  he  was  virtually 
nothing  more  than  the  literary  retainer  and  protege  of  the  leaders 
of  a  party.  His  easy  indolent  habits,  with  some  other  features  of 
his  character,  appear  in  the  following  sketch  by  Johnson : — 

"Of  the  course  of  Addison 's  familiar  day,  before  his  marriage,  Pope  has 
given  a  detail.  He  had  in  the  house  with  him  Bndgell,  and  perhaps  Philips. 
.His  cliief  companions  were  Steele,  Budgell,  Philips  [Ambrose],  Carey,  Da- 
venant,  and  Colonel  Brett.  With  one  or  other  of  these  he  always  break- 
fasted. He  studied  all  morning ;  then  dined  at  a  tavern  ;  and  went  after- 
wards to  Button's.  Button  had  been  a  servant  in  the  Countess  of  Warwick's 
family,  who,  under  the  patronage  of  Addison,  kept  a  coffee-house  on  the 
south  side  of  Russell  Street,  about  two  doors  from  Covent  Garden.  Here  it 
was  that  the  wits  of  the  time  used  to  assemble.  It  is  said,  when  Addison 
had  buffered  any  vexation  from  the  Countess,  he  withdrew  the  company 
from  Button's  house.  From  the  coffee-house  he  went  again  to  a  tavern, 
where  he  often  sat  late,  and  drank  too  much  wine.  In  the  bottle  discontent 
seeks  for  comfort,  cowardice  for  courage,  and  bashfulness  for  confidence.  It 
is  not  unlikely  that  Addison  was  first  seduced  to  excess  by  the  manumission 
which  he  obtained  from  the  servile  timidity  of  his  sober  hours." 

His  conduct  generally  was  marked  by  great  prudenca  He  made 
few  enemies.  He  was  at  great  pains  to  conciliate  Swift.  "  Of  his 
virtue  it  is  a  sufficient  testimony  that  the  resentment  of  party  has 
transmitted  no  charge  of  any  crime."  Yet  his  irritable  temper 
was  not  under  thorough  control.  On  one  occasion  he  put  an 
execution  in  force  against  Steele  for  a  hundred  pounds  that  hi» 
improvident  friend  had  borrowed,  and  he  has  never  been  cleared 
of  the  charge  of  jealous  intriguing  against  Pope.  De  Quincey,  in 
his  '  Life  of  Pope,'  says  that  "Addison's  petty  manoeuvring  against 
Pope  proceeded  entirely  from  malignant  jealousy.  That  Addison 
was  more  in  the  wrong  even  than  has  generally  been  supposed, 
and  Pope  more  thoroughly  innocent  as  well  as  more  generous,  we 
have  the  means  at  a  proper  opportunity  of  showing  decisively." 

Opinions. — In  practical  politics  he  adhered  steadfastly  to  the 
Whigs.  In  1707  he  elaborately  justified  the  war  with  France, 
maintaining  that  France  and  Britain  were  natural  enemies.  He 
strongly  supported  the  Hanoverian  succession,  and  turned  his 
most  malicious  and  unqualified  ridicule  against  the  "  Pretender  " 
and  his  foreign  adherents.  With  equal  animosity  he  satirised  the 
Tory  country  gentlemen,  or  Tory  fox-hunters,  as  he  delighted  to 
nickname  them. 

Party  politics,  as  we  have  said,  had  no  place  in  the  '  Tatler,'  the 
'Spectator,'  and  the  'Guardian.'  The  professed  object  of  onr 
author  in  these  periodicals  was  "  to  banish  vice  and  ignorance  out 
of  the  territories  of  Great  Britain,"  and  "to  bring  philosophy  out 


JOSEPH    ADDISON.  381 

of  closets  and  libraries,  schools  and  colleges,  to  dwell  in  clubs  and 
assemblies,  at  tea-tables  and  coffee  houses." 

The  minor  immoralities  that  he  attacked  were  such  as  affecta- 
tion, presumption,  foppery,  fashionable  extravagance,  upstart  vul- 
garity. As  "vices"  of  the  same  class,  he  contrived  to  satirise  the 
rustic  manners  of  the  objects  of  his  constant  aversion,  the  Tory 
squires,  "  who  had  never  seen  anything  greater  than  themselves 
for  twenty  years." 

In  criticising  polite  literature,  he  gave  his  opinions  on  the 
Opera,  on  Tragedy,  on  True  and  False  Wit,  on  Sappho,  on  Ovid, 
on  Milton,  and  on  the  Pleasures  of  the  Imagination.  He  "decided 
by  taste  rather  than  by  principles  " ;  and  the  taste  of  such  a  man, 
while  elegant  in  the  highest  degree,  had  a  tendency  to  be  captious 
and  narrow.  He  sneered  at  the  scenery  and  stage  machinery  both 
of  the  opera  and  of  the  theatre,  considering  that  the  effect  upon 
the  audience  should  be  produced  mainly  by  the  language  of  the 
play.  He  ridiculed  the  use  of  Italian  in  the  opera — for  which 
De  Quincey  makes  some  game  of  him.  Under  False  Wit  he 
reckoned  Puns,  Anagrams,  Acrostics,  Chronograms,  Crambo,  and 
other  agreeable  ingenuities.  In  the  case  of  Milton,  his  application 
of  Aristotle's  rules  for  epic  poetry,  and  his  selection  of  fine  pas- 
sages, have  the  credit  of  first  drawing  general  notice  to  '  Paradise 
Lost' l  His  papers  on  the  Pleasures  of  the  Imagination  have  no 
analytic  value ;  he  gets  no  farther  than  that  there  is  a  pleasure  in 
beholding  the  great,  the  beautiful,  and  the  new. 


ELEMENTS   OF  STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — Were  we  to  judge  from  the  papers  on  Milton,  we 
should  pronounce  Addison's  command  of  language  rather  under 
than  above  the  average  of  eminent  literary  men.2  He  is  constantly 
repeating  the  same  epithets — "inexpressibly  beautiful,"  "wonder- 
fully poetical,"  "wonderfully  fine  and  pleasing."  Upon  lighter 
themes  his  vocabulary  is  more  varied.  Choiceness  and  not  pro- 
fusion is  at  all  times  his  characteristic ;  yet  we  find  him  varying 
his  expression  with  the  greatest  ease  on  simple  themes.  Thus,  iu 
his  paper  in  the  '  Lover '  upon  the  female  passion  for  china-ware, 
he  describes  it  with  considerable  variety — "  brittle  ware,"  "  frail 
furniture,"  "  perishable  commodity,"  "  all  china-ware  is  of  a  weak 
and  transitory  nature,"  "  the  fragility  of  china  is  such  as  a  reason- 
able being  ought  by  no  means  to  set  its  heart  upon." 

1  It  is  sometimes  said  that  Addison  was  the  first  to  discern  Milton's  excel- 
lence.  This  is  saying  too  much.  Defoe  had  praised  Milton  several  years  before ; 
and  Steele,  in  one  of  his  early  'Tatlers,'  had  expressed  his  admiration. 

3  Lord  Lytton  is  of  opinion  that  Addison's  command  of  expression  was  not 
first-rate. 


382  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

Sentences. — Among  our  classic  prose  writers,  Addison  is  the 
standing  example  of  a  loose  style.  He  is  ostentatiously  easy  and 
flowing,  making  no  effort  to  be  periodic,  but  rather  studiously 
avoiding  the  periodic  structure.  In  his  expository  papers,  when 
he  is  not  expressly  aiming  at  point,  he  takes  the  utmost  freedom 
in  adding  clauses  of  explanation  and  amplification  after  he  has 
made  a  full  statement  Thus — 

"  Everything  that  is  new  or  uncommon  raises  a  pleasure  in  the  imagina- 
tion, because  it  fills  the  soul  with  an  agreeable  surprise,  gratifies  its  curiosity, 
and  gives  it  an  idea  of  which  it  was  not  before  possest.  We  are  indeed  so 
often  conversant  with  one  set  of  objects,  and  tired  out  with  so  many  repeated 
shows  of  the  same  things,  that  whatever  is  new  or  uncommon  contributes  a 
little  to  vary  human  life,  and  to  divert  our  minds  for  a  while,  with  the 
strangeness  of  its  appearance :  it  serves  us  for  a  kind  of  refreshment,  and 
takes  off  from  that  satiety  we  are  apt  to  complain  of  in  our  usual  and  ordi- 
nary entertainments." 

Here  the  structure  is  very  loose,  and  the  easy  way  of  adding 
clause  to  clause  betrays  the  writer  into  not  a  little  confusion, 
which  we  shall  notice  in  the  proper  place.  The  following  is  an- 
other example  of  a  loose  tautologous  sentence : — 

"They  here  began  to  breathe  a  delicious  kind  of  ether,  and  saw  all  the 
fields  about  them  covered  with  a  kind  of  purple  light,  that  made  them  re- 
flect with  satisfaction  on  their  past  toils,  and  diffused  a  secret  joy  through 
the  whole  assembly,  which  showed  itself  in  every  look  and  feature. " 

The  vice  of  this  careless  structure,  which  within  proper  limits 
is  not  without  its  advantages,  is  the  misplacing  of  clauses.  The 
two  following  examples  are  from  Irving' s  'Elements  of  Com- 
position ' : — 

"  This  kind  of  wit  was  very  much  in  vogue  among  our  countrymen,  about 
an  age  or  two  a^o,  who  did  not  practise  it  for  any  oblique  reason,  but  purely 
for  the  aake  of  being  witty." 

Here  the  clause  "  about  an  age  or  two  ago "  comes  very  awk- 
wardly between  the  relative  and  its  antecedent,  and  would  be 
much  better  disposed  of  at  the  beginning — ' '  About  an  age  or  two 
Ago,  this  kind  of  wit,"  &c. 

"The  Knight,  seeing  his  habitation  reduced  to  so  small  a  compass,  and 
himself  in  a  manner  shut  out  of  his  own  house,  upon  the  death  of  his 
mother,  ordered  all  the  apartments  to  be  flung  open,  and  exorcised  by  his 
chaplain." 

Irving  remarks  that  here  the  clause  "upon  the  death  of  his 
mother  "  is  so  placed  as  to  be  ambiguous,  and  proposes  to  remedy 
this  by  another  arrangement  —  namely,  "seeing  his  habitation, 
«kc.,  the  Knight,  upon  the  death  of  his  mother,  ordered  all  the 
apartments,"  <kc.  This  gets  rid  of  the  ambiguity,  but  is  rather 
a  clumsy  arrangement ;  it  would  be  better  to  begin  with  the 


JOSEPH   ADDISON.  383 

clause  of  time — "Upon  the  death  of  his  mother,  the  Knight," 
ike. 

It  is  chiefly  in  the  papers  on  the  Pleasures  of  the  Imagination 
that  the  inconvenience  of  this  loose  style  is  felt,  and  there  chiefly 
because  it  goes  along  with  a  vague  and  rambling  train  of  thought. 
On  a  light  theme  he  is  often  smart  and  pointed,  as  will  be  suffi- 
ciently illustrated  in  the  examples  of  his  Wit 

Even  iii  the  expository  papers  there  are  occasional  touches  of 
pointed  expression.  In  the  following  we  see  two  forms  of  ex- 
pression that  are  very  largely  used  by  Johnson : — 

"  A  man  of  a  polite  imagination  is  let  into  a  great  many  pleasures  that 
the  vulgar  are  not  capable  of  receiving.  He  can  converse  with  a  picture  and 
find  an  agreeable  companion  in  a  statue.  He  meets  with  a  secret  refresh- 
ment in  a  description,  and  often  feels  a  greater  satisfaction  in  the  prospect  of 
fields  and  meadows  than  another  does  in  the  possession." 

Sometimes,  but  not  often,  he  makes  the  effort  of  a  careful 
balanced  comparison.  The  following  comparison  between  Homer 
and  Virgil  is  from  a  paper  where  he  exhibits  Homer,  Virgil,  and 
Ovid  as  specimens  respectively  of  "  what  is  great,  what  is  beauti- 
ful, and  what  is  new."  It  is  a  much  simpler  comparison  than 
either  Temple's  or  Pope's,  being  more  superficial — dealing  with 
fewer  circumstances ;  besides,  it  is  less  just,  the  facts  being  ad- 
apted to  suit  the  author's  theory: — 

"  Homer  is  in  his  province  when  he  is  describing  a  battle  or  a  multitude, 
•  hero  or  a  god.  Virgil  is  never  better  pleased  than  when  he  is  in  his 
Elysium  or  carrying  out  an  entertaining  picture.  Homer's  epithets  gener- 
ally mark  out  what  is  great,  Virgil's  what  is  agreeable.  Nothing  can  be 
more  magnificent  than  the  figure  Jupiter  makes  in  the  first  Iliad,  nor  more 
charming  than  that  of  Venus  in  the  first  ./Eneid. "  [Here  the  passages  are 
quoted.]  "  Homer's  persons  are  most  of  them  godlike  and  terrible;  Virgil 
has  scarce  admitted  any  into  his  poem  who  are  not  beautiful,  and  has  taken 
particular  care  to  make  his  hero  so — 

And  gave  his  rolling  eyes  a  sparkling  grace, 
And  breathed  a  youthful  vigour  on  his  face. 

In  a  word,  Homer  fills  his  readers  with  sublime  ideas,  and,  I  believe,  has 
rained  the  imagination  of  all  the  good  poets  that  have  come  after  him.  I 
.  shall  only  instance  Horace,  who  immediately  takes  fire  at  the  first  hint  of 
any  passage  in  the  '  Iliad '  or  *  Odyssey,'  and  always  rises  above  himself 
when  he  has  Homer  in  his  view.  Virgil  has  dmwn  together,  into  hih 
'  jEneid,'  all  the  pleasing  scenes  his  subject  is  capable  of  admitting ;  and 
in  his  'Georgics,'  has  given  us  a  collection  of  the  most  delightful  land- 
scapes that  can  be  made  out  of  fields  and  woods,  herds  of  cattle,  and  swarms 
of  bees." 

QUALITIES  OF   STYLE. 

Simplicity  has  always  been  alleged  as  a  great  merit  of  Addison's 
style — "  familiar,"  says  the  imperious  dictator,  "  but  not  coarse." 
"  His  prose  is  the  model  of  the  middle  style;,  on  grave  subjects 


384  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

not  formal,  on  light  occasions  not  grovelling,  pure  without  scrnpu- 
losity,  and  exact  without  apparent  elaboration ;  always  equable, 
always  easy,  without  glowing  words  or  pointed  sentences.  Addi- 
son  never  deviates  from  his  track  to  snatch  a  grace ;  he  seeks  no 
tunbitious  ornaments,  and  tries  no  hazardous  innovations." 

To  this  merit  in  the  expository  papers,  there  are  considerable 
drawbacks.  I  would  not  insist  with  De  Quincey  on  his  superficial 
treatment  of  Milton  and  of  the  Imagination.  It  is  probably  but 
a  slight  exaggeration  to  say  that  he  was  "  the  man  of  all  that  ever 
lived  most  hostile  even  to  what  was  good  in  pedantry,  to  its 
tendencies  towards  the  profound  in  erudition,  towards  minute 
precision,  and  the  non- popular;  .  .  .  the  champion  of  all 
that  is  easy,  natural,  superficial."  And  it  is  but  fair  to  say, 
that  if,  as  he  boasted,  he  brought  "  Philosophy  out  of  closets 
and  libraries,  schools  and  colleges,  to  dwell  in  clubs  and  assem- 
blies, at  tea-tables  and  coffee-houses,"  it  certainly  was  Philosophy 
in  a  very  diluted  form.  But  in  a  periodical  such  as  the  '  Specta- 
tor '  the  superficiality  and  dilution  were  not  out  of  place ;  "  an 
instructor  like  Addison  was  now  wanting,  whose  remarks,  being 
superficial,  might  be  easily  understood,  and  being  just,  might 
prepare  the  mind  for  more  attainments." 

Still,  it  should  be  possible,  without  going  into  more  abstruse 
considerations,  to  make  such  papers  as  those  on  the  Pleasures  of 
the  Imagination  not  only  more  accurate,  but  even  more  intelligible 
and  more  easily  remembered. 

One  great  improvement  in  the  way  of  rendering  the  papers 
more  perspicuous  would  be  to  state  explicitly  their  real  char- 
acter; to  lower  their  pretensions;  to  declare  them  to  be  not  a 
philosophic  explanation  of.  aesthetic  pleasures,  but  an  enumera- 
tion of  objects  that  give  pleasure  to  the  imagination  as  being 
great,  beautiful,  or  new.  Were  this  done,  the  reader  would  go 
on  smoothly, — receiving  first  an  account  of  pleasing  objects  in 
nature;  then  in  artificial  works,  gardens,  and  buildings;  then  in 
the  Fine  Arts,  statuary,  painting,  music,  poetry,  history,  natural 
philosophy.  Once  aware  that  the  papers  were  nothing  more 
than  a  catalogue  of  things  "  apt  to  affect  the  imagination,"  the 
reader  could  pass  lightly  over  the  moral  reflections  and  crude 
attempts  at  deeper  explanation,  as  being  but  irregular  excres- 
cences upon  the  plan. 

Such,  we  say,  is  the  real  character  and  value  of  the  papers — 
the  divisions  become  simple  only  when  looked  upon  in  this  light ; 
and  had  the  author  consulted  the  ease  and  instruction  of  the 
reader,  he  would  have  indicated  this  at  the  beginning,  and  re- 
peated the  indication  as  he  went  on.  But  the  truth  is  that  he 
did  not  know  their  real  character — he  imagined  he  was  going 
deeper  than  he  really  went ;  and  in  perplexing  the  reader  with  a 


JOSEPH    ADDISOX.  385 

futile  straining  after  explanation,  he  was  bat  repeating  his  own 
perplexity. 

A  good  deal  might  be  done  to  make  the  papers  more  exact, 
without  going  deeper  into  the  matter. 

His  statements  are  frequently  ambiguous.     For  example — 

"  The  prettiest  landscape  I  ever  saw  was  one  drawn  on  the  walls  of  a  dark 
room,  which  stood  opposite  on  one  side  to  a  navigable  river,  and  on  the  other 
to  a  park." 

This  gives  as  good  an  opening  for  ingenious  conjecture  as  the 
most  involved  passages  in  the  ancient  classics;  a  collection  of 
such  passages  would  be  no  mean  substitute  for  classical  discipline 
of  the  ingenuity.  At  first  sight  one  wonders  how  he  could  see  a 
picture  in  a  dark  room,  and  what  the  river  and  the  park  had  to  do 
with  it.  If  the  ingenious  student  refer  to  the  context,1  he  may  be 
able  to  see  the  meaning  without  the  help  of  a  commentator ;  but 
if  so,  he  must  be  very  ingenious  indeed.  As  an  example  not  so 
hopelessly  puzzling,  but  very  misleading,  take  the  following  open- 
ing of  one  of  the  Essays,  marking  an  important  transition  in  the 
subject : — 

"  I  at  first  divided  the  pleasures  of  the  imagination  into  such  as  arise  from 
objects  that  are  actually  before  our  eyes,  or  that  once  entered  in  at  our  eyes, 
and  are  afterwards  called  up  into  the  mind  either  barely  by  its  own  opera- 
tions, or  on  occasion  of  something  without  us,  as  stitues  or  descriptions. 
We  have  already  considered  the  first  division,  and  shall  therefore  enter  on 
the  other,  which,  for  distinction  sake,  1  have  called  the  secondary  pleasures 
of  the  imagination." 

The  first  sentence  states  the  two  divisions :  let  the  reader  try  to 
discover  them  without  reading  through  the  whole  paper,  and  the 
chances  are  that  the  expression  misleads  him.  Without  attempt- 
ing to  recast  the  sentence,  which  might  lead  to  an  irrelevant  scru- 
tiny of  the  division  itself,  the  following  modification  will  make 
the  meaning  plainer: — 

"  I  at  first  divided  the  pleasures  of  the  imagination  into  such  as  arise  from 
objects  that  are  actually  before  our  eyes,  and  such  as  arise  from  objects  that, 
once  having  entered  in  at  our  eyes,  are  afterwards,"  &c. 

Another  breach  of  accuracy,  too,  often  committed  in  these 
papers  on  the  Imagination,  is  to  repeat  the  same  statement  in 
a  different  form  as  if  it  were  a  different  statement  Look  back 
for  an  example  of  this  tautology  to  a  passage  quoted  among  tho 
Sentences  (p.  382) — "  Everything  that  is  new  or  uncommon,"  &c. 
In  the  first  sentence  three  expressions  are  identical,  and  the  fourth 
is  only  slightly  different — "  new  or  uncommon  raises  a  pleasure  in 
the  imagination,"  "fills  the  soul  with  an  agreeable  surprise," 
"gratifies  its  curiosity,"  "gives  it  an  idea  of  which  it  was  not 

1  Spectator,  No.  414.   The  Essays  on  the  Imagination  are  reprinted  separately. 

2  B 


386  FROM    1700  TO   1730. 

before  posse&t : "  — yet  the  three  last  of  those  expressions  are 
given  as  the  explanation  of  the  first.  So  much  confused  feeble- 
ness we  discover  when  we  take  the  sentence  to  pieces  with  chari- 
table latitude — "a  novelty  is  agreeable  when  it  is  agreeable." 
Were  we  to  take  the  sentence  in  its  grammatical  strictness,  we 
should  find  him  affirming  a  more  questionable  principle — namely, 
that  "  every  novelty  is  agreeable."  The  second  sentence  in  this 
passage  is  equally  unfitted  for  close  examination. 

He  makes  comparatively  little  use  of  contrast  for  the  purpose  of 
giving  clearness  to  his  views.  This  makes  his  pages  smoother  read- 
ing for  such  as  are  averse  to  the  trouble  of  close  thinking  and  dis- 
like squareness  of  form  ;  but  it  is  no  small  drawback  to  perspicuity. 
At  least  when  he  does  make  a  contrast,  the  form  ought  to  be  clear, 
and  very  often  it  is  not.  Thus — 

"By  greatness  I  do  not  only  mean  the  bulk  of  any  single  object,  but  the 
largeness  of  a  whole  view  " — 

should  be — 

"  By  greatness  I  mean  not  only  the  bulk  of  a  single  object,  but  the  large- 
ness of  a  whole  view  ;  " 

or,  more  perspicuously — 

"I  apply  the  term  greatness  to  a  whole  view  as  well  as  to  a  single  object" 
Again — 

"I  must  confess,  after  having  surveyed  the  antiquities  about  Naples  and 
Borne,  I  cannot  but  think  that  our  admiration  of  them  does  not  so  much  arise 
out  of  their  greatness  as  uncommonness." 

This  should  be — "  Arises  not  so  much  from  their  greatness  as 
from  their  uncommonness." 

Take  yet  another  example  of  this  careless  use  of  the  forms  of 
contrast — 

"There  is  as  much  difference  between  comprehending  a  thought  clothed 
in  Cicero's  language,  and  that  of  an  ordinary  writer,  as  between  seeing  an 
object  by  tbe  light  of  a  taper  and  the  light  of  the  sun." 

Here  the  form  of  the  expression  implies  exactly  the  opposite  of 
what  he  means. 

Sometimes,  from  an  affectation  of  polite  ease,  he  does  not  choose 
the  aptest  word.  Thus — 

"Those  who  look  into  Homer  are  surprised  to  find  his  battles  still  rising 
one  above  another,  and  improving  in  horror  to  the  conclusion  of  the  '  Iliad.' 
Milton's  fight  of  the  angels  is  wrought  up  with  the  same  beauty." 

Such  improprieties  are  a  source  of  feebleness  rather  than  of  con- 
fusion. As  a  rule,  Addison's  papers,  particularly  those  on  lighter 
themes,  are  distinguished  by  the  aptness  of  the  phraseology.  The 
chief  thing  that  tempts  him  to  err  is  the  study  of  elegance. 


JOSEPH   ADDISON.  387 

Strength  is  not  a  feature  of  Addison's  prose.  He  has  neither 
sublimity  nor  vigour :  "  a  model,"  as  Johnson  says,  "of  the  middle 
style,"  "always  equable,  always  easy,  without  glowing  words  or 
pointed  sentences." 

In  the  matter  of  Pathos  he  is  very  unlike  his  warm-hearted 
coadjutor  Steele, 

The  Ludicrous. — It  is  upon  the  witty  vein  in  his  writings  that 
Addison's  fame  is  durably  founded.  His  elegant  satires  on  the 
manners  of  his  time  will  be  read  with  delight  when  his  grave 
essays  are  glanced  at  as  productions  that  made  no  small  noise  on 
their  first  appearance,  but  were  too  superficial  to  be  permanent. 

He  is  the  great  English  example  of  polite  ridicule.  The  poig- 
nancy of  his  sarcasm  is  so  disguised  and  softened  by  elegance  of 
language,  ingenuity  of  wit,  and  affectation  of  kindliness,  that  he  is 
often  pointed  out  as  a  crowning  instance  of  amiable  humour.  The 
error  would  probably  have  less  often  been  committed  had  he  not 
been  conjoined  with  Steele,  a  writer  of  genuinely  amiable  humour. 
However  that  may  be,  it  is  an  error,  and  one  that  needs  little  dis- 
cernment for  its  discovery.  Not  a  single  paper  of  Addison's  can 
be  pointed  out  that  does  not  contain  some  stroke  of  malice — "  gay 
malevolence,"  perhaps,  but  nevertheless  malevolence.  The  wit  and 
polish  are  exquisite.  The  satire  is  usually  pointed  at  classes,  and 
not  at  individuals ;  if  it  is  pointed  at  individuals,  they  are  not  real 
personages,  but  imaginary  types  of  classes.  He  sometimes  affects 
kindliness  for  the  object  of  his  shafts.  All  these  arts  keep  the 
sufferer  out  of  view,  and  enable  us  to  enjoy  the  witty  sallies  with- 
out scruple.  Still,  in  characterising  his  humour,  the  critic  must 
not  sink  the  fact  that  it  is  at  basis  malicious — it  is  "  humorous 
satire."  If  we  call  it  amiable  humour,  we  must  remember  that  it 
is  a  kind  of  humour  that  may  be  amiable  to  the  reader  or  hearer, 
but  is  far  from  appearing  amiable  to  the  object 

In  exemplifying  his  satire,  we  shall  follow  the  order  of  Criti- 
cism, Politics,  and  Society. 

In  No.  5  of  the  *  Spectator,'  he  opens  his  batteries  on  the 
scenery  and  stage-machinery  of  the  opera: — 

"As  I  was  walking  in  the  streets  about  a  fortnight  ago,  I  saw  an  ordinary 
fellow  carrying  a  cage  full  of  little  birds  upon  his  shoulder ;  and,  as  1  waa 
wondering  with  myself  what  use  he  would  put  them  to,  he  was  met  very 
luckily  by  an  acquaintance,  who  had  the  same  curiosity.  Upon  his  asking 
him  what  he  had  upon  his  shoulder,  he  told  him  that  he  had  been  buying 
sparrows  for  the  opera.  '  Sparrows  for  the  opera, '  says  his  friend,  licking 
his  lips,  'what,  are  they  to  be  roasted?'  'No,  no,'  says  the  other,  'they 
are  to  enter  towards  the  end  of  the  first  Act,  and  to  fly  about  the  stage. ' 
This  strange  dialogue  awakened  iny  curiosity  so  far,  that  I  immediately 
bought  the  opera,  by  which  means  I  perceived  that  the  sparrows  were  to 
act  the  part  of  singing-birds  in  a  delightful  grove ,  though  upon  a  nearer 
enquiry  I  found  the  sparrows  put  the  same  trick  upon  the  audience  that  Sir 
Martin  Alar-ull  practised  upon  his  mist russ ;  for  though  they  flew  in  sight, 


388  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

the  music  proceeded  from  a  consort  of  flageolets  and  bird-calls  which  were 
planted  behind  the  scenes.  .  .  .  But  to  return  to  the  sparrows ;  there 
have  been  so  many  flights  of  them  let  loose  in  this  opera,  that  it  is  feared 
the  house  will  never  get  rid  of  them ;  and  that  in  other  plays  they  make 
their  entrance  in  very  improper  scenes,  so  as  to  be  seen  flying  in  a  lady's 
bed-chamber,  or  perching  upon  a  king's  throne ;  besides  the  inconveniences 
which  the  heads  of  the  audience  may  sometimes  suffer  frwn  them." 

Writing  of  English  translations  of  Italian  operas,  and  malici- 
ously remarking  on  the  blunders  of  the  translators,  he  says : — 

"  I  remember  an  Italian  verse  that  ran  thus  word  for  word—- 
And turned  my  rage  into  pity ; 
which  the  English  for  rhyme  sake  translated — 

And  into  pity  turned  my  rage. 

By  this  means  the  soft  notes  that  were  adapted  to  pity  in  the  Italian,  fell 
upon  the  word  rage  in  the  English,  and  the  angry  sounds  that  were  turned 
to  rage  in  the  original  were  made  to  express  pity  in  the  translation.  It 
oftentimes  happened  likewise,  that  the  finest  notes  in  the  air  fell  upon  the 
most  insignificant  words  in  the  sentence.  I  have  known  the  word  and  pur- 
sued through  the  whole  gamut,  have  been  entertained  with  many  a  melo- 
dious the,  and  have  heard  the  most  beautiful  graces,  quavers,  and  divisions 
bestowed  upon  them,  for,  and  from,  to  the  eternal  honour  of  our  English 
particles." 

This  exquisitely  worded  criticism  is  somewhat  malicious  towards 
the  poor  singers  and  their  audience;  the  satire  was  no  doubt  whole- 
some, and  the  arch  satirist  could  plead  the  sanction  of  good  sense, 
but  there  is  not  much  amiability  in  the  spirit  of  such  ridicule.  His 
ridicule  of  the  Tory  squires  is  by  no  means  so  delicate.  He  had 
carefully  studied  the  character,  with  the  sharp  insight  of  inveterate 
dislike,  and  exposes  all  the  weak  points  of  their  rusticity  with 
unmerciful  exaggeration.  One  of  his  first  contributions  to  the 
'  Tatler '  is  an  account  of  a  visit  paid  him  in  his  own  apartment  by 
Sir  Harry  Quickset,  Sir  Giles  Wheelbarrow,  Knight,  Thomas  Rent- 
free,  Esquire,  Justice  of  the  Quorum,  Andrew  Windmill,  Esquire, 
and  Mr  Nicholas  Doubt,  of  the  Inner  Temple,  Sir  Harry's  grand- 
son. He  had  been  forewarned  of  his  distinguished  company  by  a 
letter  from  Sir  Harry's  steward : — 

"  The  hour  of  nine  was  come  this  morning,  and  I  had  no  sooner  set  chairs, 
by  the  steward's  letter,  and  fixed  my  tea-equipage,  but  I  heard  a  knock  at 
my  door,  which  was  opened,  but  no  one  entered ;  after  which  followed  a 
long  silence,  which  was  broke  at  last  by,  '  Sir,  I  beg  your  pardon,  I  think  I 
know  better; '  and  another  voice,  '  Nay,  good  Sir  Giles.'  I  looked  out  from 
my  window,  and  saw  the  good  company  all  with  their  hats  off,  and  arms 
spread,  offering  the  door  to  each  other.  .  .  .  But  they  are  now  got  to 
my  chamber-door,  and  I  saw  my  old  friend  Sir  Harry  enter.  I  met  him 
with  all  the  respect  due  to  so  reverend  a  vegetable ;  for,  you  are  to  know, 
that  is  my  sense  of  a  person  who  remains  idle  in  the  same  place  for  half  a 
century.  I  got  him  with  j,M'eat  HUCCOSS  into  his  chair  by  the  fire,  without 
throwing  down  any  of  my  cups.  ...  I  had  the  misfortune,  as  they  stood 


JOSEPH   ADDISON.  389 

cheek  by  jowl,  to  desire  the  squire  to  sit  down  before  the  justice  of  the  quo- 
rum, to  the  no  small  satisfaction  of  the  former,  and  resentment  of  the  latter." 
[On  the  squire's  refusing  to  take  tea,  th«  steward  proposed  an  adjournment 
to  some  public-house.]  "  We  all  stood  up  in  an  instant,  and  Sir  Harry  filed 
off  from  the  left,  very  discreetly,  countermarching  behind  the  chairs  towards 
the  door.  After  him,  Sir  Giles  in  the  same  manner.  The  simple  squire 
made  a  sudden  start  to  follow ;  but  the  justice  of  the  quorum  whipped 
between  upon  the  stand  of  the  stairs.  A  maid  going  up  with  coals,  made 
us  halt,  and  put  us  into  such  confusion  that  we  stood  all  in  a  heap,  without 
any  visible  possibility  of  recovering  our  order.  .  .  .  We  were  fixed  in 
this  perplexity  for  some  time,  until  we  heard  a  very  loud  noise  in  the  street; 
and  Sir  Harry  asking  what  it  was,  I,  to  make  them  move,  said  '  it  was  fire.' 
Upon  this,  all  ran  down  as  fast  as  they  could,  without  order  or  ceremony, 
into  the  street,  where  we  drew  up  in  very  good  order,  and  filed  off  down 
Steer  Lane  ;  the  impertinent  templar  driving  ua  before  him  as  in  a  string, 
and  pointing  to  his  acquaintance  who  passed  by." 

Another  of  hid  rustic  characters  in  the  '  Tatler '  is  Tom  Bellfrey, 
the  fox-hunter,  who  gives  an  imitation  of  a  fox-chase  in  a  London 
drawing-room,  and  "calls  all  the  neighbouring  parishes  into  the 
square."  The  most  frequently  quoted  of  these  caricatures  is  the 
"Tory  Fox-liunter,"  drawn  with  unsparing  skill  in  the  'Free- 
holder.' Upon  this  character  Dr  Nathan  Drake  remarks : — 

"The  character  of  the  Tory  Fox-hunter  is,  it  must  be  confessed,  in  every 
respect  less  ainiaMe  and  respectable  thau  that  of  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley ; 
we  neither  love  nor  esteem  him  ;  for,  instead  of  the  sweet  and  benevolent 
temper  of  the  knight,  we  are  here  presented  with  a  vulgar,  rough,  and 
totally  uneducated  squire,  whose  credulity  and  absurd  prejudices  are  not 
softened  down  or  relieved  by  those  mild  and  tender  feelings  which  so  greatly 
endear  to  us  almost  every  incident  in  the  life  of  Sir  Roger. " 

Yet  Addison's  share  in  the  character  of  Sir  Roger  is  really  a  cari- 
cature of  rusticity,  not  one  whit  better-natured  than  the  Fox- 
hunter.  We  shall  notice  more  fully,  in  treating  of  Steele,  that 
"  the  sweet  and  benevolent  temper,"  "  the  mild  and  tender  feel- 
ings," are  Steele's  contributions  to  the  character  of  the  knight. 
This  is  not  the  only  instance  where  Addison  has  profited  by  his 
alliance  with  Steele. 

His  character  of  Will  Wimble  is  a  sharp  and  considerably,  over- 
charged satire  on  the  younger  sons  of  the  aristocracy.  While  he 
professes  deep  compassion  that  "so  good  a  heart  and  such  busy 
hands  were  wholly  employed  in  trifles,"  he  exposes  those  trifling 
occupations  with  anything  but  a  loving  hand.  Will  "  generally 
lives  with  his  elder  brother  as  superintendent  of  his  game;"  "is 
extremely  well  versed  in  all  the  little  handicrafts  of  an  idle  man;" 
"  is  a  good-natured,  officious  fellow ; "  "  carries  a  tulip-root  in  his 
pocket  from  one  to  another,  or  exchanges  a  puppy  between  a 
couple  of  friends  that  live  perhaps  in  the  opposite  sides  of  the 
country."  This  is  said  to  be  "  the  case  of  many  a  younger  brother 
of  a  great  family,  who  had  rather  see  their  children  starve  like 


390  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

gentlemen,  than  thrive  in  a  trade  or  profession  that  is  beneath 
their  quality."  To  profess  compassion  after  drawing  such  a  picture 
is  to  add  keenness  to  the  sting. 

Of  his  satires  on  society,  very  short  examples  must  suffice.  Any 
of  his  papers  will  illustrate  the  poignancy  of  the  strokes,  and  the 
exceeding  delicacy  and  ingenuity  of  the  expression.  Perhaps  the 
most  characteristic  examples  of  this  vein  of  his  satire  are  seen  in 
his  delicate  application  of  caustic  to  the  foibles  of  women.  He 
was  animated  by  nothing  like  Steele's  chivalrous  gallantry  to- 
wards the  sex.  Take  the  following  on  the  female  passion  for 
china,  his  contribution  to  Steele's  short-liveJ  '  Lover ' : — 

"There  are  no  inclinations  in  women  which  more  surprise  me  than  their 
passions  for  chalk  and  china.  The  lirst  of  these  maladies  wears  out  in 
a  little,  time  ;  but  when  a  woman  is  visited  with  the  second,  it  generally 
takes  possession  of  her  for  life.  China  vessels  are  playthings  for  women  of 
all  ages.  An  old  lady  of  fourscore  shall  be  as  busy  in  cleaning  an  Indian 
mandarin,  as  her  great-granddaughter  is  in  dressing  her  baby. 

"  The  common  way  of  purchasing  such  trifles,  if  I  may  believe  my  female 
informers,  is  by  exchanging  old  suits  of  clothes  for  this  brittle  ware.  The 
potters  of  China  have,  it  seems,  tlieir  factors  at  this  distance,  who  retail  out 
their  several  manufactures  for  cast  clothes  and  superannuated  garments.  I 
have  known  an  old  petticoat  metamorphosed  into  a  punch-bowl,  and  a  pair 
of  breeches  into  a  teapot,"  &c. 

In  this  example  the  wit  is  not  quite  worthy  of  Addison,  and 
the  derision  borders  on  coarseness.  As  an  extreme  contrast,  take 
a  passage  from  the  exquisitely  graceful  paper  on  the  '  Use  of  the 
Fan '  :— 

"Women  are  armed  with  fans,  as  men  with  swords,  and  sometimes  do 
more  execution  with  them.  To  the  end  therefore  that  ladies  may  be  entire 
mistresses  of  the  weapon  which  they  bear,  I  have  erected  an  academy  for 
the  training  up  of  youug  women  in  the  exercise  of  the  fan,  according  to  the 
most  fashionable  airs  and  motions  that  are  now  practised  at  Court.  The 
ladies  who  carry  fans  under  rue  are  drawn  up  twice  a-day  in  my  great  hall, 
where  they  are  instructed  in  the  use  of  their  arms,  and  exercised  by  the  fol- 
lowing words  of  command  : — 

Handle  your  fans, 

Unfurl  your  fans, 

Discharge  your  tana, 

Ground  your  fans, 

Recover  your  fans, 

Flutter  your  fans. 

By  the  right  observation  of  these  few  plain  words  of  command,  a  woman  of 
a  tolerable  genius  who  will  apply  herself  diligently  to  her  exercise  for  the 
space  of  but  one  half-year,  shall  be  able  to  give  her  fan  all  the  graces  that 
can  possibly  enter  into  that  little  modish  machine. 

....  "The  Fluttering  of  the  Fan  is  the  last,  and  indeed  the  master- 
piece of  the  whole  exercise  ;  but  if  a  lady  does  not  misspend  her  time,  she 
may  make  herself  mistress  of  it  in  three  months.  I  generally  lay  aside  the 
dog-days  and  the  hot  time  of  the  summer  for  the  teaching  this  part  of  the 
exercise,  for  ns  soon  as  ever  I  pronounce  Flutter  your  Fans,  the  place  is  filled 
with  so  many  zephyrs  and  gentle  breezes  as  are  very  refreshing  in  that 


JOSEPH  ADDISON.  391 

season  of  the  year,  though  they  might  be  dangerous  to  ladies  of  a  tendei 
constitution  in  any  other. 

"There  is  an  infinite  variety  of  motions  to  he  made  use  of  in  the  Flutter 
of  a  Fan  :  there  is  the  angry  flutter,  the  modest  flutter,  the  timorous  flutter, 
the  confused  flutter,  the  merry  flutter,  and  the  amorous  flutter.  Not  to  be 
tedious,  there  is  scarce  any  emotion  in  the  mind  which  does  not  produce  a 
suitable  agitation  in  the  fan  ;  insomuch,  that  if  I  only  see  the  fan  of  a  dis- 
ciplined lady,  I  know  very  well  whether  she  laughs,  frowns,  or  blushes." 

Not  content  with  satirising  the  ladies  of  his  own  generation,  he 
carries  his  cynical  raillery  of  the  sex  into  imaginary  generations, 
before  the  Flood.  In  his  papers  on  the  loves  of  Shaluin  and 
Hilpah,  the  humour  receives  a  satirical  turn  from  the  imputation 
of  unworthy  motives  to  Hilpah. 

Besides  the  redeeming  graces  of  expression,  two  things  may  be 
urged  in  extenuation  of  the  malicious  or  satirical  basis  of  Addison's 
wit.  First,  his  ridicule  is  not  personal ;  it  is  aimed  at  what  the 
author  takes  to  be  vice,  folly,  or  bad  taste,  not  at  an  actual  offender. 
Secondly,  "it  is  justly  observed  by  Tickell  that  he  employed  wit 
on  the  side  of  virtue  and  religion." 

Melody. — A  good  deal  of  Johnson's  panegyric  of  Addison's  style 
is  really  the  picture  of  an  ideal  to  which,  in  his  opinion,  Addison 
approaches ;  but  many  of  the  particulars  are  happy,  and  none  more 
so  than  this — that  "  it  was  his  principal  endeavour  to  avoid  all 
harshness  and  severity  of  diction ;  he  is  therefore  sometimes  ver- 
bose in  his  transitions  and  connections,  and  sometimes  descends 
too  much  to  the  language  of  conversation."  The  melodious  flow 
of  the  diction  is  a  very  striking  quality  of  our  author's  style ; 
and  doubtless  his  endeavour  after  this  beauty  accounts  for  many 
of  his  sins  against  precision.  In  the  Appendix  to  Bain's  '  Rhetoric,' 
a  passage  is  analysed  with  a  view  to  this  quality,  and  it  is  traced  to 
the  fewness  of  abrupt  consonants  or  harsh  combinations,  the  variety 
of  the  vowels,  and  "  the  rhythmical  construction,  or  the  alternation 
of  long  and  short,  emphatic  and  unemphatic  sounds." 

Taste. — Elegance  is  the  ruling  quality  of  Addison's  style.  He 
sacrifices  everything  to  the  unctuous  junction  of  syllables,  and  the 
harmonious  combination  of  ideas.  The  pedantic  scholarship  of 
Taylor,  the  rough  vigour  and  profusion  of  Barrow,  are  illustrative 
by  extreme  contrast  But  we  might  go  the  round  of  our  great 
writers  without  finding  such  another  example  of  superficial  smooth- 
ness. We  have  remarked  the  studied  refinement  of  Temple ;  but 
in  Temple  refinement  is  united  with  majesty  and  depth  of  feeling. 
Cowley's  diction  is  studied,  and  his  thoughts  light  and  trivial ;  but 
as  compared  with  Addison,  his  rhythm  is  often  awkward  and 
stumbling,  his  fancy  exuberant,  and  his  ridicule  bare  and  un- 
disguised. 

The  following  is  at  once  an  illustration  of  his  elegant  treatment 


392  FROM    1700  TO   1730. 

of  a  thomw  that  might  easily  be  made  pedantic,  and  an  example  of 
the  principles  that  guided  his  own  composition  : — 

"Allegories,  when  well  chosen,  are  like  so  many  tracks  of  light  in  a  dis- 
course, that  make  everything  about  them  clear  and  beautiful.  A  noble 
metaphor,  when  it  is  pbiced  to  an  advantage,  casts  a  kind  of  glory  round 
it,  and  darts  a  lustre  through  a  whole  sentence.  These  different  kinds  of 
allusion  are  but  so  many  different  manners  of  similitude,  and  that  they  may 
please  the  imagination,  the  likeness  ought  to  be  very  exact,  or  very  agree- 
able, as  we  love  to  see  a  picture  where  the  resemblance  is  just,  or  the  posture 
and  air  graceful.  But  we  often  find  eminent  writers  very  faulty  in  this 
respect ;  great  scholars  are  apt  to  letch  their  comparisons  and  allusions  from 
the  sciences  in  which  they  are  most  conversant,  so  that  a  man  may  see  the 
compass  of  their  learning  in  a  treatise  on  the  most  indifferent  subject.  I 
have  read  a  discourse  upon  love  which  none  but  a  profound  chymist  could 
understand,  and  have  heard  many  a  seniion  that  should  only  have  been 
preached  before  a  congregation  of  Cartesians.  On  the  contrary,  your  men 
of  business  usually  have  recourse  to  such  instances  as  are  too  mean  and 
familiar.  They  are  for  drawing  the  reader  into  a  game  of  chess  or  tennis,  or 
for  leading  him  from  shop  to  shop,  in  the  cant  of  particular  trades  and  em- 
ployments. It  is  certain  there  may  be  found  an  infinite  variety  of  very 
agreeable  allusions  in  both  these  kinds  ;  but  for  the  generality,  the  most 
entertaining  ones  lie  in  the  works  of  nature,  which  are  obvious  to  all  capa- 
cities, and  more  delightful  than  what  is  to  be  found  in  arts  and  sciences. 

SIB  RICHARD    STEELE,   1675-1729. 

"  When  Mr  Addison  was  abroad,"  writes  Thackeray,  "  and  after 
he  came  home  in  rather  a  dismal  way  to  wait  upon  Providence  in 
his  shabby  lodging  in  the  Haymarket,  young  Captain  Steele  was 
cutting  a  much  smarter  figure  than  that  of  his  classical  friend 
of  Charterhouse  Cloister  and  Maudlin  Walk."  Steele,  born  in 
Dublin,  of  English  parents,  was  also  a  Charterhouse  boy  and  an 
Oxonian,  his  college  being  Merton.  A  gay,  impetuous  youth, 
overflowing  with  wit  and  good-nature,  and  fond  of  company,  he 
yet  gained  some  celebrity  as  a  scholar,  and  before  he  graduated 
had  written  a  poem  and  a  comedy.  When  he  had  to  choose  a 
profession  he  fixed  upon  the  army  ;  and  his  friends  refusing  to 
buy  him  a  commission,  he  enlisted  as  a  private  in  the  Horse 
Guards.  His  wit  making  him  a  general  favourite,  he  had,  by  the 
year  1701,  been  promoted  to  the  rank  of  captain  in  the  Fusiliers. 
He  is  said  to  have  passed  a  dissipated  and  reckless  life :  he  "  prob- 
ably wrote  and  sighed  for  Bracegirdle,  went  home  tipsy,  in  many 
a  chair,  after  many  a  bottle,  in  many  a  tavern — fled  from  many  a 
bailiff."  But  if  this  debauchery  was  as  bad  as  has  been  repre- 
sented, in  the  midst  of  it  all  he  kept  up  his  literary  tastes.  In 
1701  he  published  'The  Christian  Hero,'  a  curious  production  for 
a  dissipated  officer,  and  an  indication  of  the  sinning  and  repent- 
ing character  of  the  man.  In  the  following  year  he  produced  a 
comedy,  'The  Funeral,  or,  Grief  a  la  Mode,'  a  satire  on  hired 


SIR  RICHARD   STEELE.  393 

mourners  and  will-making  lawyers.  By  the  death  of  King  William 
he  lost  his  chances  of  promotion  in  the  army,  and  turned  all  his 
powers  to  literature  and  politics.  In  1703  appeared  his  comedy  of 
'The  Tender  Husband;'  in  1704  the  'Lying  Lovers,'  a  piece  too 
tame  and  moralising  to  succeed  on  the  stage  of  those  days.  About 
1705,  through  the  influence  of  his  friend  Addison,  he  was  ap- 
pointed Gazetteer — "the  lowest  Minister  of  State,"  as  he  face- 
tiously styled  himself.  We  shall  not  follow  the  windings  of  his 
fortunes  chronologically.  His  literary  projects  were — '  The  Tatler,' 
*  The  Spectator,'  '  The  Guardian,'  and  '  The  Lover,'  already  men- 
tioned; 'The  Englishman'  and  'The  Crisis,'  1714  (two  intense 
political  pamphlets,  which  led  to  his  expulsion  from  the  House 
of  Commons);  'The  Reader,'  1714,  also  political,  like  Addison's 
'  Whig  Examiner,'  an  opposition  print  to  the  Tory  '  Examiner ' ; 
occasional  political  and  anti-Popery  tracts ;  a  collection  of  his 
political  writings,  1715  ;  'The  Town-Talk,'  'The  Tea-Table,'  'The 
Chit-Chat,'  short- lived  periodicals,  1716;  in  1719  'The  Plebeian,' 
which  was  opposed  by  Addison  in  the  '  Old  Whig,'  and  produced 
a  quarrel  between  the  two  friends;  'The  Theatre,'  a  periodical, 
1719-20,  under  the  feigned  name  of  Sir  John  Edgar;  'The  Con- 
scious Lovers,'  his  best  comedy,  1722.  His  Government  appoint- 
ments were,  after  the  Gazetteership,  Commissionership  of  Stamps, 
1710;  Surveyorship  of  the  Royal  Stables  at  Hampton  Court,  and 
Governorship  of  the  Royal  Company  of  Comedians,  1715;  Com- 
missionership of  Forfeited  Estates  in  Scotland,  1717. 

His  personal  appearance  would  seem  to  have  been  rather  un- 
favourable. The  satirical  portrait  by  John  Dennis  is  said  by 
Thackeray  to  bear  "a  dreadful  resemblance"  to  the  original — 

"  Sir  John  Edgar,  of  the  county  of ,  in  Ireland,  is  of  a  middle 

etature,  broad  shoulders,  thick  legs,  a  shape  like  the  picture  of 
somebody  over  a  farmer's  chimney — a  short  chin,  a  short  nose,  a 
short  forehead,  a  broad  flat  face,  and  a  dusky  countenance" 

As  we  may  judge  from  this  picture,  he  possessed  great  bodily 
energy,  and  his  constitutional  vigour  supported  him  in  the  heartiest 
enjoyment  of  life.  Living  in  a  whirl  of  social  dissipation,  he  yet, 
as  Gazetteer,  as  editor  of  periodicals,  and  in  other  offices,  went 
through  a  great  deal  of  worrying  business;  and  in  the  hurry  of 
his  active  life  was  constantly  snatching  moments  to  despatch  little 
notes  to  his  "dearest  Prue."  Of  these  affectionate  billets,  Mrs 
Steele  preserved  no  less  than  400. 

His  intellect  was  of  a  rougher  cast  than  his  friend's.  It  is  the 
emotional  character  of  the  man  that  renders  him  interesting,  and 
entitles  him  to  a  good  secondary  place  among  our  great  writers  of 
prose.  Probably  a  large  fraction  of  his  energy  was  spent  in  the 
rollicking  enjoyment  of  existence ;  otherwise  his  rank  would  have 
been  higher  than  it  is.  His  contributions  to  the  '  Spectator '  and 


394  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

allied  periodicals  take  their  distinction  from  his  prevailing  tender- 
ness of  heart  and  wide  acquaintance  with  human  life.  To  him 
these  papers  owe  their  pathos,  their  humour,  and  their  extraordi- 
nary variety  of  characters.  He  loved  company,  and  the  quickness 
of  his  sympathies  made  him  constantly  alive  to  differences  in  the 
personalities  of  his  companions. 

His  habits  were  irregular ;  he  had  not  the  familiar  routine  and 
select  circle  of  Addison.  He  was  under  no  necessity  of  economis- 
ing his  energies ;  he  seems  to  have  been  capable  of  bearing  prac- 
tically any  amount  of  work  and  dissipation.  He  had  small  power 
of  resisting  the  impulses  of  emotion.  His  plans  for  the  day  were 
easily  disconcerted  by  the  entrance  of  a  good  companion.  In 
politics,  when  any  of  his  darling  principles  seemed  to  be  in  danger, 
he  rushed  to  the  rescue  without  regard  to  consequences. 

In  this  place  we  shall  remark  upon  and  exemplify  chiefly  hia 
pathos  and  his  humour.  His  characters  are  really  artistic  creations, 
and  belong  to  poetry  und  fiction. 

On  the  other  qualities  of  his  style  we  remark  cursorily.  In 
command  of  words  he  is  not  equal  to  Addison  ;  his  choice  is  much 
less  felicitous.  His  sentence  composition  is  irregular  and  careless, 
often  ungrammatical :  writing  in  the  character  of  a  Tatler,  he 
thought  it  incumbent  to  assume  "  incorrectness  of  style,  and  an 
air  of  common  speech" — a  style  very  agreeable  to  his  own  in- 
clinations. He  has  not  the  polished  and  felicitous  melody  of 
Addison.  His  language  and  sentiments  are  much  more  glowing 
and  extravagant ;  his  papers  may  be  distinguished  by  this  feature 
alone. 

The  chief  differences  between  his  own  style  and  Addison's  are 
well  summed  up  by  himself — "  The  elegance,  purity,  and  correct- 
ness in  his  writings  were  not  so  much  my  purpose  as,  in  any  in- 
telligible manner  as  I  could,  to  rally  all  those  singularities  ol* 
human  life,  through  the  different  professions  and  characters  in 
it,  which  obstruct  anything  that  was  truly  good  and  great" 

Paihos. — Steele  is  one  of  the  most  touching  of  our  writers. 
Himself  of  a  nature  the  reverse  of  melancholy,  he  yet  at  certain 
seasons  "  resolved  to  be  sorrowful "  ;  and  when  the  sorrowful 
mood  was  upon  him,  the  incidents  that  he  recalled  or  imagined 
were  of  the  most  heartrending  character.  The  kind  of  pathos 
that  we  find  in  him  would  not  be  pathetic  at  all,  in  a  poetic 
sense,  to  the  more  delicate  order  of  sensibilities :  it  would  be  a 
pain,  and  not  an  aesthetic  pleasure.  There  are  not  many  of  these 
affecting  papers  in  either  'Tatler,'  'Spectator,'  or  'Guardian.' 
Most  of  those  that  do  appeal  to  our  tender  sensibilities  lay  before 
us  situations  of  extreme  anguish.  We  shall  quote  two  examples, 
in  which  the  extreme  painfulness  of  the  incidents  is  relieved  only 


SIB  RICHARD  STEELE.  395 

by  the  exhibition  of  extreme  devotedness.     The  first  is  the  story 
of  Unnion  and  Valentine  ('  Tatler,'  No.  5) : — 

"At  the  siege  of  Namur  by  the  Allies,  there  were  in  the  ranks,  of  the 
company  commanded  by  Captain  Pincent,  in  Colonel  Frederick  Hamilton's 
regiment,  one  Unnion,  a  corporal,  and  one  Valentine,  a  private  centinel ; 
there  happened  between  these  two  men  a  dispute  about  a  matter  of  love, 
which,  upon  some  aggravations,  grew  to  an  irreconcileable  hatred.  Unnion, 
being  the  officer  of  Valentine,  took  all  opportunities  even  to  strike  his  rival, 
and  profess  the  spite  and  revenge  which  moved  him  to  it.  The  centinel  bore 
it  without  resistance,  but  frequently  said  he  would  die  to  be  revenged  of  that 
tyrant.  They  had  spent  whole  months  thus,  one  injuring,  the  other  com- 
plaining; when,  in  the  midst  of  this  rage  towards  each  other,  they  were 
commanded  upon  the  attack  of  the  castle,  where  the  corporal  received  a  shot 
in  the  thigh,  and  fell ;  the  French  pressing  on,  and  he  expecting  to  be 
trampled  to  death,  called  out  to  his  enemy,  '  Ah,  Valentine !  can  you  leave 
me  here  ? '  Valentine  immediately  ran  back,  and  in  the  midst  of  a  thick 
fire  of  the  French,  took  the  corporal  upon  his  back,  and  brought  him 
through  all  that  danger,  as  far  as  the  abbey  of  Salsine,  where  a  cannon-ball 
took  off  his  head :  his  body  fell  under  his  enemy  whom  he  was  carrying  off. 
Unnion  immediately  forgot  his  wound,  rose  up,  tearing  his  hair,  and  then 
threw  himself  upon  the  bleeding  carcase,  crying,  'Ah,  Valentine!  was  it 
for  me,  who  have  so  barbarously  used  tliee,  that  thou  hast  died  I  I  will  not 
live  after  thee  ! '  He  was  not  by  any  means  to  be  forced  from  the  body,  but 
was  removed  with  it  bleeding  in  his  arms,  and  attended  with  tears  by  all 
their  comrades  who  knew  their  enmity.  When  he  was  brought  to  a  tent, 
his  wounds  were  dressed  by  force;  but  the  next  day,  still  calling  upon 
Valentine,  and  lamenting  his  cruelties  to  him,  he  died  in  the  pangs  of  re- 
morse and  despair." 

This  story  is  given  "  in  order  to  inspire  the  love  and  admiration 
of  worthy  actions,"  and  "  as  an  instance  of  the  greatness  of  spirit 
in  the  lowest  of  her  Majesty's  subjects."  The  next  is  a  deathbed 
scene,  from  an  account  of  a  family  where  Mr  Bickerstaff  was  very 
intimate  ('Tatler,'  Nos.  95,  114): — 

"  I  went  up  directly  to  the  room  where  she  lay,  and  was  met  at  the 
entrance  by  my  friend,  who,  notwithstanding  his  thoughts  had  been  com- 
posed a  little  before,  at  the  sight  of  me  turned  away  his  face  and  wept. 
The  little  family  of  children  renewed  their  expressions  of  their  sorrow  ac- 
cording to  their  several  ages  and  degrees  of  understanding.  The  eldest 
daughter  was  in  tears,  busied  in  attendance  upon  her  mother ;  others  were 
kneeling  about  the  bedside  ;  and  what  troubled  me  most  was,  to  see  a  little 
boy,  who  was  too  young  to  know  the  reason,  weeping  only  because  his 
sisters  did.  The  only  one  in  the  room  who  seemed  resigned  and  comforted 
vas  the  dying  person.  At  my  approach  to  the  bedside,  she  told  me,  with  a 
low  broken  voice,  '  This  is  kindly  done.  Take  care  of  your  friend— do  not 
go  from  him.'  She  had  before  taken  leave  of  her  husband  and  children,  ia 
a  manner  proper  for  so  solemn  a  parting,  and  with  a  gracefulness  peculiar 
to  a  woman  of  her  character.  My  heart  was  torn  in  pieces,  to  see  the  hus- 
band on  one  side  suppressing  and  keeping  down  the  swellings  of  his  grief, 
for  fear  of  disturbing  her  in  her  last  moments  ;  and  the  wife,  even  at  that 
time,  concealing  the  pains  she  endured,  for  fear  of  increasing  his  affliction. 
She  kept  her  eyes  upon  him  for  some  moments  after  she  grew  speechless, 
and  soon  after  closed  them  for  ever,  la  the  moment  of  her  departure,  my 


396  FROM  1700  TO   1730. 

friend,  who  had  thus  far  commanded  himself,  gave  a  deep  groan,  and  fell 
into  a  swoon  by  her  bedside. " 

We  have  evidence  that  Steele  himself  was  overpowered  by  the 
painfulness  of  his  own  creations.  It  is  said  that  after  writing  the 
above  deathbed  scene  he  was  so  affected  as  to  be  unable  to  pro- 
ceed :  the  commonplace  consolations  that  follow  in  the  original 
are  said  to  have  been  appended  by  Addison.  Sometimes  he  seeks 
relief  from  his  painful  recollections  or  imaginations  by  violent 
expedients.  In  one  paper  a  most  touching  soliloquy  is  interrupted 
by  a  knock  at  the  door,  and  the  arrival  of  a  hamper  of  wine ; 
whereupon  he  sends  for  three  of  his  friends,  and  restores  himself 
to  cheerfulness  by  the  generous  warmth  of  two  bottles.  In  another 
he  works  upon  his  reader's  feelings  till  they  reach  the  point  of 
agony,  and  then  suddenly  transfers  the  horrible  scene  to  dream- 
land : — 

"  I  was  once  myself  in  agonies  of  grief  that  are  unutterable,  and  in  so 
great  a  distraction  of  mind,  that  I  thought  myself  even  out  of  the  possibility 
of  receiving  comfort.  The  occasion  was  as  follows.  When  I  was  a  youth 
in  a  part  of  the  army  which  was  then  quartered  at  Dover,  I  fell  in  love  with 
an  agreeable  young  woman  of  a  good  family  in  those  parts,  and  had  the 
satisfaction  of  seeing  my  addresses  kindly  received,  which  occasioned  the 
perplexity  I  am  going  to  relate. 

"  We  were  in  a  calm  evening  diverting  ourselves  upon  the  top  of  the  cliff 
with  the  prospect  of  the  sea,  and  trifling  away  the  time  in  such  little  fond- 
nesses as  are  most  ridiculous  to  persons  in  business,  and  most  agreeable  to 
those  in  love. 

"  In  the  midst  of  these  our  innocent  endearments,  she  snatched  a  paper 
of  verses  out  of  my  hand,  and  ran  away  with  them.  I  was  following  her  ; 
when  on  a  sudden  the  ground,  though  at  a  considerable  distance  from  the 
verge  of  the  precipice,  sank  under  her,  and  threw  her  down  from  so  pro- 
digious a  height,  upon  such  a  range  of  rocks,  as  would  have  dashed  her  into 
ten  thousand  pieces,  had  her  body  been  made  of  adamant.  It  is  much  easier 
for  my  reader  to  imagine  my  state  of  mind  upon  such  an  occasion  than  for 
me  to  express  it.  I  said  to  myself,  It  is  not  in  the  power  of  Heaven  to  re- 
lieve me  !  when  I  awaked,  equally  transported  and  astonished,  to  see  myself 
drawn  out  of  an  affliction  which,  the  very  moment  before,  appeared  to  me  al- 
together inextricable." 

The  Ludicrous. — Steele's  humour  is  distinguished  from  Addison's 
chiefly  by  two  circumstances — unaffected  geniality  and  heartiness, 
and  less  delicate  elaboration. 

Steele  was  a  kindly  observer  of  human  frailties.  Against  what 
he  considered  to  be  heartlessness  and  vice  he  was  openly  indignant : 
his  natural  tendency  was  to  use  the  lash  freely  in  hot  blood — not 
to  introduce  galling  points  of  satire  with  a  smiling  countenance. 
Minor  faults,  affectation,  presumption,  a  dictatorial  manner,  and 
suchlike,  he  ridiculed  with  good-humour,  with  a  certain  fellow- 
feeling  for  the  objects  of  his  ridicule. 

At  the  same  time,  he  had  not  enough  patient  skill  to  work  out 


SIR   RICHARD   STEELE.  397 

a  ludicrous  conception  into  the  exquisite  details  that  give  such  a 
charm  to  the  papers  of  Addison.  By  comparison  with  his  coad- 
jutor, he  is  sketchy  and  declamatory. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  find  illustrations  of  both  of  these  points. 
In  several  cases  Addison  has  taken  up  Steele's  conception,  and 
worked  it  out  with  more  elaborate  skill,  at  the  same  time  turning 
it  into  a  more  slyly  malicious,  or  at  least  a  colder,  vein. 

For  example,  we  have  quoted  (p.  390)  Addison's  exquisite  paper 
on  the  use  of  the  Fan.  Let  us  look  now  at  the  original  conception 
in  the'Tatler.'  The  "beauteous  Delamira"  being  about  to  be 
married,  the  "  matchless  Virgulta  "  beseeches  her  to  tell  the  secret 
of  her  manner  of  charming : — 

"  Delamira  heard  her  with  great  attention,  and  with  that  dexterity  which 
is  natural  to  her,  told  her  that  '  all  she  had  above  the  rest  of  her  sex  and 
contemporary  beauties  was  wholly  owing  to  a  fan  (that  was  left  her  by  her 
mother,  and  had  been  long  in  the  family),  which,  whoever  had  in  posses- 
sion, and  used  with  skill,  should  command  the  hearts  of  all  beholders  ;  and 
since,'  said  she,  smiling,  '1  have  no  more  to  do  with  extending  my  con- 
quests or  triumphs,  I  will  make  you  a  present  of  this  inestimable  rarity.' 
Virgulta  made  her  expressions  of  the  highest  gratitude  for  so  uncommon  a 
confidence  in  her,  and  begged  she  would  '  show  her  what  was  peculiar  in  the 
management  of  that  utensil,  which  rendered  it  of  such  general  force  while 
she  was  mistress  of  it.'  Delamira  replied,  '  You  see,  madam,  Cupid  is  the 
principal  figure  painted  on  it ;  and  the  skill  in  playing  this  fan  is,  in  your 
several  motions  of  it,  to  let  him  appear  as  little  as  possible  ;  for  honourable 
lovers  fly  all  endeavours  to  ensnare  them ;  and  your  Cupid  must  hide  his 
bow  and  arrow,  or  he  will  never  be  sure  of  his  game.  You  may  observe,' 
continued  she,  'that  in  all  public  assemblies,  the  sexes  seem  to  separate 
themselves,  and  draw  up  to  attack  each  other  with  eye-shot :  that  is  the 
time  when  the  fan,  which  is  all  the  armour  of  a  woman,  is  of  most  use  in 
our  defence ;  for  our  minds  are  construed  by  the  waving  of  that  little  instru- 
ment, and  our  thoughts  appear  in  composure  or  agitation,  according  to  the 
motion  of  it.  ...  Cymon,  who  is  the  dullest  of  mortals,  and  though  a 
wonderful  great  scholar,  does  not  only  pause,  but  seems  to  take  a  nap  with 
his  eyes  open  between  every  other  sentence  in  his  discourse :  him  have  I 
made  a  leader  in  assemblies  ;  and  one  blow  on  the  shoulder  as  I  passed  by 
him  has  raised  him  to  a  downright  impertinent  in  all  conversations.  The 
airy  Will  Sampler  is  become  as  lethargic  by  this  my  wand,  as  Cymon  ia 
•prightly.  Take  it,  good  girl,  and  use  it  without  mercy. ' " 

Compare  this  with  Addison's  railing  proposal  to  teach  the  use 
of  the  fan,  and  his  elaborate  exposure  of  all  the  arts.  A  gallant 
tenderness  for  the  sex  shines  through  "  good-hearted  Dick's"  mock- 
heroic  humour.  Addison  politely  holds  the  sex  up  to  ridicule; 
Steele  sympathises  with  their  little  artifices,  and  even  insinuates 
a  piece  of  genuine  good  advice  as  to  the  best  means  of  success. 

As  another  field  for  comparison,  take  their  sketches  of  Clubs, 
None  of  Addison's  Clubs  have  the  rollicking  humour  of  the  Ugly 
Clvb,  and  none  of  Steele's  have  the  mean  and  sordid  insinuations 
contained  in  the  rules  of  the  Twopenny  Club.  On  the  other  hand, 


398  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

even  the  Ugly  Club,  which  was  a  favourite  conception,1  is  far  from 
having  the  minute  finish  of  the  Everlasting  Club. 

The  difference  between  the  humour  of  the  two  writers  is  nowhere 
more  conspicuous  than  in  the  papers  upon  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley. 
Steele's  Sir  Roger  is  quite  a  different  person  from  Addison's  Sir 
Roger.  All  that  is  amiable  in  the  conception  belongs  to  Steele. 
His  first  paper  ('  Spectator,'  No.  2)  represents  Sir  Roger  as  a  jolly 
country  gentleman,  "  keeping  a  good  house  both  in  town  and  coun- 
try ; "  a  lover  of  mankind,  with  such  a  mirthful  cast  in  his  behav- 
iour, that  he  is  beloved  rather  than  esteemed;  unconfined  to  modes 
and  forms,  disregarding  the  manners  of  the  world  when  he  thinks 
them  in  the  wrong ;  when  he  enters  a  house,  calling  the  servants 
by  their  names,  and  talking  all  the  way  up-stairs  to  a  visit  He 
had  been  a  man  of  fashion  in  his  youth,  but  being  crossed  in  love 
by  a  beautiful  widow,  had  grown  careless  of  his  person,  and  never 
dressed  afterwards.  Steele's  subsequent  papers,  Nos.  6,  107,  109, 
113,  1 1 8,  174,  bear  out  this  description — give  examples  of  his 
common-sense,  of  his  considerate  treatment  of  his  servants,  of  his 
gratitude,  to  one  of  them  for  saving  his  life,  and  of  his  occasional 
singularities  of  behaviour.  The  knight  is  made  to  explain  his  own 
eccentricities  as  a  result  of  his  love  disappointment — "  Between 
you  and  me,"  he  says,  "  I  am  often  apt  to  imagine  it  has  had  some 
whimsical  effect  upon  my  brain,  for  I  frequently  find  that,  in  my 
most  serious  discourse,  I  let  fall  some  comical  familiarity  of  speech 
or  odd  phrase,  that  makes  the  company  laugh."  Such  is  Sir  Roger 
according  to  Steele — an  easy,  good-natured  gentleman,  of  good 
sense,  purposely  setting  at  nought  the  conventions  of  fashion,  sin- 
gular and  eccentric,  but  aware  of  his  eccentricities.  In  Addison's 
hands  he  becomes  a  very  different  character.  He  is  transformed 
into  a  good-natured  Tory  fox-hunter.  He  retains  the  good-nature 
and  the  eccentricity ;  he  drops,  except  in  name,  the  good  sense, 
and  the  familiar  knowledge  of  town  life.  Addison  makes  him 
a  thorough  rustic ;  autocratic,  self-important,  ignorant,  credulous. 
True,  he  is  at  great  pains  to  repeat  that  Sir  Roger  was  much 
esteemed  for  his  universal  benevolence — "  at  peace  within  himself, 

1  The  Ugly  Club,  and  the  difficulties  met  with  in  finding  members,  form  one 
of  the  best  specimens  of  Steele's  rollicking  humour.  In  giving  an  account  of  it, 
he  makes  the  following  humorous  confession  in  the  person  of  the  Spectator: 
"  For  my  own  part,  I  am  a  little  unhappy  in  the  mould  of  my  face,  which  is  not 
quite  so  long  as  it  is  broad.  Whether  this  might  not  partly  arise  from  my  open- 
ing my  mouth  much  seldomer  than  other  people,  and  by  consequence  not  so 
much  lengthening  the  fibres  of  my  visage,  I  am  not  at  leisure  to  determine. 
However  it  be,  1  have  been  often  put  out  of  countenance  by  the  shortness  of 
my  face,  and  was  formerly  at  great  pains  in  concealing  it  by  wearing  a  periwig 
with  a  high  foretop,  and  letting  my  beard  grow.  But  now  I  have  thoroughly 
got  over  the  delicacy,  and  could  be  contented  were  it  much  shorter,  provided  it 
might  qualify  me  for  a  member  of  the  Merry  Club,  which  the  following  letter 
gives  me  an  account  of." 


SIk   RICHARD   STEELE.  399 

and  esteemed l  by  all  about  him."  But  this  affectation  of  respect 
for  the  knight  is  a  sly  artifice  to  bring  him  into  ridiculous  situa- 
tions No.  106,  the  first  of  Addison's  papers,  is  the  most  amiable 
part  of  the  picture,  and  seems  designed  to  let  Steele's  conception 
down  softly.  Yet  even  this  paper  shows  Sir  Roger  in  a  ridiculous 
light,  inconsistent  with  the  following  paper,  No.  107,  by  Steele. 
Loth  knight  and  servants  are  pleasantly  caricatured  in  No.  106 — 
"  You  would  take  his  valet  de  diambre  for  his  brother,  his  butler  is 
grey-headed,  his  groom  is  one  of  the  gravest  men  that  I  have  ever 
Been,  and  his  coachman  has  the  looks  of  a  privy  councillor."  His 
chaplain  was  chosen  for  his  "  good  aspect,  clear  voice,  and  sociable 
temper":  "at  his  first  settling  with  me,"  says  Sir  Roger,  "I  made 
him  a  present  of  all  the  good  sermons  which  have  been  printed  in 
English,  and  only  begged  of  him  that  every  Sunday  he  would  pro- 
nounce one  of  them  in  the  pulpit"  Among  these  venerable  domes- 
tics the  good  knight  is  treated  like  an  infant.  "  When  he  is  pleasant 
upon  a^y  of  them,  all  his  family  are  in  good  humour,  and  none  so 
much  as  the  person  whom  he  diverts  himself  with :  on  the  contrary, 
if  he  coughs  or  betrays  any  infirmity  of  old  age,  it  is  easy  for  a 
stander-by  to  observe  a  secret  concern  in  the  looks  of  all  his  ser- 
vants." After  this  opening  sketch  of  Sir  Roger's  good-nature,  we 
are  presented  with  some  exquisitely-wrought  pictures  of  his  ridic- 
ulous doings.  He  exorcises  the  shut-up  rooms  of  his  house,  by 
making  the  chaplain  sleep  in  them.  In  church  "  he  suffers  nobody 
to  sleep  besides  himself ;  for  if  by  chance  he  has  been  surprised 
into  a  short  nap  at  sermon,  upon  recovering  out  of  it  he  stands  up 
and  looks  about  him,  and  if  he  sees  anybody  else  nodding,  either 
wakes  them  himself,  or  sends  his  servant  to  them ; "  he  lengthens 
out  a  verse  half  a  minute  after  the  rest  of  the  congregation,  says 
Amen  three  or  four  times,  and  calls  out  to^John  Matthews  to  mind 
what  he  is  about,  and  not  disturb  the  congregation.  He  had  been 
a  great  fox-hunter  in  his  youth.  He  would  have  given  over  Moll 
White,  the  witch,  to  the  County  Assizes,  had  he  not  been  dissuaded 
by  the  chaplain.  Perhaps  the  most  exquisitely  ludicrous  of  his 
adventures  are  his  journey  to  the  Assizes,  and  his  speech  there 
(No.  122);  his  visit  to  Westminster  Abbey  (329);  his  observations 
on  "  The  Distressed  Mother,"  in  the  playhouse  :  in  all  these  situa- 
tions he  is  merely  a  good-natured,  credulous,  unsophisticated  butt 
for  the  delicate  ridicule  of  his  companion  the  Spectator. 

While  there  is  such  a  difference  between  the  conceptions  of  the 
tvro  writers,  there  is  a  still  greater  difference  in  the  execution.  In 

1  Esteemed. — Steele  had  said  that  Sir  Roger  was  rather  beloved  than  esteemed. 
But  tliis  was  estimating  the  knight  by  the  standard  of  his  town  friends.  Addi- 
Bon  places  him  entirely  in  the  country,  and  represents  him  as  an  object  of  great 
admiration  and  respect  to  the  simple  country -people,  thereby  getting  a  douhU 
(ratification  for  his  contempt  of  the  country  or  Tory  party. 


400  FROM   1700  TO    1730. 

point  of  literary  skill,  any  one  of  Addison's  papers  is  worth  all 
Steele's  put  together.  Stcele  is  sketchy  and  rude,  and  mars  the 
portraiture  with  patches  of  moralising.  Addison  fills  in  the  minute 
touches  with  his  most  exquisite  skill.1 


OTHER  WRITERS. 

THEOLOGY. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land began  to  rest  from  her  labours  against  Papacy,  and  to  turn 
her  forces  against  a  new  enemy.  A  new  topic  engaged  all  clergy- 
men of  a  literary  and  controversial  disposition,  and  the  general 
tone  of  their  sermons  underwent  a  corresponding  change.  For 
such  changes  one  cannot  assign  a  definite  year ;  it  takes  time  to 
give  a  new  direction  to  the  energies  of  a  large  body  of  different 
men.  We  must  be  content  to  say  that  a  religious  revolution  took 
place  during  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century  and  the  beginning 
of  the  eighteenth.  If  we  dip  into  the  writings  of  Churchmen 
twenty  years  before  the  end  of  the  century,  we  find  their  polemic 
tracts  burning  with  zeal  against  Papacy,  and  their  sermons  ad- 
ministering the  consolations  and  warnings  of  Christianity,  in  full 
assurance  of  its  divine  origin.  Twenty  years  after  the  end  of  the 
century  we  breathe  a  different  atmosphere.  The  Church  was  then 
on  the  alert  against  a  new  antagonist — the  all-absorbing  topic  was 
the  controversy  with  the  Deists.  Tracts  poured  from  the  press ; 
young  aspirants  to  the  bench  were  eager  to  break  a  lance  with 
Toland  or  with  Collins.  Sermons  were  largely  influenced  by  the 
prevailing  controversy.  Devotional  ardour  was  replaced  by  polem- 
ical ardour,  by  a  desire  to  "  prove  the  reasonableness  "  of  Christi- 
anity. Whatever  was  the  preacher's  text,  his  anxiety  was  to 
"  prove "  that  it  was  eminently  suited  to  the  condition  of  men, 
eminently  calculated  to  make  them  happy.  Sublimity  and  pathos 
were  banished  fr.iin  the  pulpit,  and  argument  reigned  in  their  stead. 
The  great  majority  of  the  sermons  preached  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury were  "  tedious  moral  essays "  :  their  favourite  exhortations 

1  It  is  an  example  of  the  injustice  done  to  Steele  by  the  admirers  of  Addison, 
and  also  of  the  want  of  discrimination  in  their  homage,  that  they  give  Addison 
credit  for  the  amiability  of  the  character  as  well  as  for  the  skill  of  the  portrait- 
ure. There  can  be  no  doubt  that,  in  this  as  in  other  cases,  Addison  profited 
greatly  by  his  alliance  with  Steele ;  the  original  suggestiveness  of  discursive 
"  Dick  "  gave  many  a  hint  for  the  elaborating  skill  of  his  friend.  The  laborious 
Dr  Drake  thinks  it  a  subject  for  regret  that  Steele's  first  draughts  do  not  com- 
bine better  with  Addison's  full  and  accurate  picture ;  condescends  to  say  that 
Nos.  107  and  109  "carry  on  the  costume  and  design  of  Addison  with  undeviat- 
ing  felicity  "  ;  and  thinks  it  "  an  ingenious  conjecture  of  Dr  Aikin,  that  Addison 
intended,  through  the  medium  of  Sir  Roger's  weakness,  to  convey  an  indirect 
•at  ire  on  the  coulined  iiotioua  and  political  prejudices  of  the  country  gentleman  "  I 


THEOLOGY.  401 

were  "to  abstain  from  vice,  to  cultivate  virtue,  to  fill  our  station 
in  life  with  propriety,  to  bear  the  ills  of  life  with  resignation,  and 
to  use  its  pleasures  moderately." 

Not  a  few  of  the  theologians  of  this  period  might  be  grouped 
together  as  taking  part  in  the  trial  of  the  Bible  by  common  reason. 
Towards  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century  rationalism  was  pre- 
dominant among  learned  students  of  religion,  whether  in  the 
Church  or  out  of  it.  By  nearly  all  theologians  it  seemed  taken 
for  granted  that  tlie  Bible  was  not  to  be  received  without  question 
as  the  authoritative  word  of  God,  but  was  to  be  tried  by  its  agree- 
ment with  reason.  Some  accepted  these  evidences,  some  did  not ; 
orthodoxy  was  sharply  assailed  by  heterodoxy,  and  issued  numerous 
sharp  replies.  The  controversy  did  nothing  appreciable  for  the 
advancement  of  English  style.  None  of  the  combatants  could  be 
called  great  masters  of  language.1 

The  three  most  distinguished  Churchmen  of  this  generation, 
Atterbury,  Hoadley,  and  Clarke,  did  not  win  their  reputation  in 
the  war  against  the  Deists.  Atterbury  is  known  chiefly  as  a 
politician  ;  Hoadley  by  his  views  regarding  Church  and  State; 
Clarke  as  a  scholar,  and  a  writer  on  Natural  Theology  and  Ethics. 
In  literary  power  they  are  much  inferior  to  the  three  great  divines 
of  the  preceding  age,  Barrow,  Tillotson,  and  South. 

Francis  Atterbury  (1662-1732),  Bishop  of  Rochester,  was  an 
uncompromising  champion  of  the  High  Church  and  Tory  party. 
The  son  of  a  rector  in  Buckinghamshire,  he  was  sent  to  Westminster 
School  and  to  Christ  Church.  As  a  scholar,  he  was,  according  to 
Macaulay,  more  brilliant  than  profound.  He  took  part  in  the 
celebrated  "  Battle  of  the  Books."  He  was  tutor  to  Charles  Boyle, 
the  editor  of  '  Phalaris,'  and  is  generally  understood  to  have  written 
the  reply  to  Bentley's  first  short  criticism  of  the  Letters  (1694). 
He  distinguished  himself  greatly  in  1 700  by  supporting  the  High 
Church  view  of  the  powers  of  the  Lower  House  of  Convocation. 
He  is  supposed  to  have  borne  a  chief  part  in  framing  the  speech 
pronounced  by  Sacheverell  at  the  bar  of  the  House  of  Lords. 
When  the  Tories  rose  into  power,  he  was  made  Dean  of  Christ 
Church,  and  afterwards  Bishop  of  liochester.  After  the  accession 
of  George,  he  was  suspected  of  intriguing  with  the  Pretender,  and 
formally  banished  in  1723.  He  died  in  France.  He  was  a  bold, 
turbulent  man,  having  an  ambition  that  would  not  rest  short  of 
the  highest  power ;  eloquent,  a  dazzling  master  of  controversial 
fence ;  so  audacious  in  his  statements  and  clever  in  his  personali- 
ties, that  on  two  occasions  he  vanquished  his  superiors  in  learning, 
and  made  the  worse  appear  the  better  reason.  "  Such  arguments 

1  The  best  succinct  account  of  the  religious  thought  of  this  generation  and  the 
following  is  contained  in  Mr  Mark  I'atti.son's  "Tendencies  of  Religious  Thought 
iu  England,  1688-1750,"  one  of  the  '  Essays  auU  tte  views!' 

2  O 


402  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

as  he  had  he  placed  in  the  clearest  light.  Where  he  had  no  argu- 
ments, he  resorted  to  personalities,  sometimes  serious,  generally 
ludicrous,  always  clever  and  cutting.  But  whether  he  was  grave 
or  merry,  whether  he  reasoned  or  sneered,  his  style  was  always 
pure,  polished,  and  easy."  His  diction  is  not  quite  so  pure  as 
Swift's  or  Addison's ;  and  it  is  easy  in  the  sense  of  fluent  and 
racy,  not  in  the  sense  of  languid. 

Benjamin  Hoadley  or  Hoadly  (1676-1761),  successively  Bishop 
of  Bangor,  Hereford,  Salisbury,  and  Winchester,  wrote  against  the 
pretensions  of  High  Churchmen  and  Tories.  On  more  than  one 
occasion  he  crossed  swords  with  Atterbury.  His  most  famous 
work  was  a  sermon  preached  before  George  I.  soon  after  his  eleva- 
tion to  the  bench,  on  the  '  Nature  of  the  Kingdom  of  Christ.'  The 
text — "  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world  " — was  a  good  clue  to 
the  contents.  He  strongly  advocated  the  subordination  of  the 
Church  to  the  State.  The  sermon  made  a  great  sensation.  It 
drew  upon  the  author  a  formal  censure  from  the  Lower  House  of 
Convocation,  whose  independent  privileges  had  been  maintained 
by  Atterbury ;  and  it  originated  what  is  known  as  the  Bangorian 
controversy,  an  engagement  of  some  forty  or  fifty  pamphlets.  His 
collected  works  occupy  three  volumes,  published  by  his  son  in 
1773.  His  style  is  in  general  vigorous  and  caustic  ;  he  seems  care- 
less of  elegance,  and  his  dry  sarcasms  have  lost  their  interest 

The  other  eminent  divine  of  the  period  is  Dr  Samuel  Clarke 
(1675-1729),  the  pupil  and  friend  of  Newton.  As  a  scholar,  he 
translated  Kohault's  '  Physics '  into  English,  Newton's  '  Optics ' 
into  Latin,  edited  Caesar's  'Commentaries,'  and  published  the 
first  twelve  books  of  the  '  Iliad '  with  a  Latin  version.  As  a  theo- 
logian, he  is  known  chiefly  by  an  illusory  attempt  to  give  a  mathe- 
matical demonstration  of  the  existence  of  God,  which  he  undertook 
upon  the  suggestion  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton.  In  the  Boyle  Lectures 
(1704-5)  he  promulgated  an  ethical  system  whose  chief  proposition 
is  that  goodness  and  virtue  consist  in  the  observance  of  certain 
"eternal  fitnesses."  In  1715  he  joined  Newton  in  a  famous  con- 
troversy with  Leibnitz,  who  had  represented  the  Newtonian  phil- 
osophy as  both  false  and  subversive  of  religion.  His  views  on 
the  Trinity  and  on  some  other  points  hindered  his  advancement  in 
the  Church.  As  regards  style,  Clarke's  sermons  may  almost  be 
said  to  have  been  the  models  of  the  Scotch  "  moderate  "  school  of 
preachers — heavy,  prolix,  argumentative,  full  of  practical  good 
sense,  and  possessing  none  of  the  ardour  familiar  to  us  under  the 
name  "  Evangelical" 

The  leading  "  Deists "  (so-called)  were  Toland,  Collins,  Wool- 
Eton,  and  Tindal.  With  these  might  be  reckoned  Shaftesbury: 
only  he,  from  his  rank  (as  Mr  Pattiaun  thinks),  was  refuted 


THEOLOGY.  403 

with  less  warmth,  and  had  not  the  same  notoriety  aa  a  con- 
troversialist. 

John  Toland  (1669-1722)  was  born  near  Londonderry,  of  Catho- 
lic parents,  took  a  degree  at  Glasgow,  and  studied  afterwards  at 
Leyden  and  Oxford.  His  'Christianity  not  Mysterious,'  1696, 
caused  none  the  less  excitement  that  its  quarrel  with  orthodoxy 
was  chiefly  concerning  the  word  "mysterious."  He  accepted  the 
Bible  theory  of  the  origin  of  sin,  only  labouring  to  make  out  that 
there  was  nothing  mysterious  about  it.  He  did  not  repudiate 
miracles ;  he  only  held  that  there  was  nothing  mysterious  in  an 
all-powerful  Being  breaking  through  the  order  of  nature.  Pro- 
fessor Ferrier  styles  him  "  but  a  poor  writer,"  and  charges  him 
with  "  dulness,  pedantry,  vanity,  and  indiscretion." 

Anthony  Collins  (1676-1729),  a  gentleman  of  independent  for- 
tune, with  an  Eton  and  Cambridge  education,  and  the  training  of 
a  barrister,  an  esteemed  young  friend  of  Locke's,  wrote  several 
works  that  engaged  him  in  controversy  with  the  most  eminent 
divines  of  the  time.  In  1707  he  discussed  the  value  of  testimony, 
making  polemical  capital  out  of  the  30,000  doubtful  readings  that 
Dr  John  Mill  had  set  down  in  his  edition  of  the  New  Testament. 
In  1710,  in  a  'Vindication  of  the  Divine  Attributes,'  he  contended 
that  predestination  is  incompatible  with  "  freedom  "  of  the  human 
will,  and  that  the  will  is  not  "free."  In  1713  his  'Discourse  on 
Free  Thinking '  claimed  unlimited  permission  to  discuss  the  prob- 
lems of  religion.  In  1724  appeared  his  most  notorious  work — 
'  Discourse  on  the  Grounds  and  Keasons  of  the  Christian  Religion ' ; 
this  publication  was  replied  to  by  all  the  talent  of  the  Church. 
"The  moral  character  of  this  writer  stands  extremely  high  for 
temperance,  humanity,  and  benevolence  j  and  both  as  a  magistrate 
and  a  man  he  acquired  general  esteem."  Though  not  orthodox, 
he  was  religious ;  he  declared  on  his  deathbed  that  he  had  endea- 
voured to  serve  both  God  and  his  country.  His  style  is  simple, 
clear,  and  concise;  he  has  none  of  the  iconoclastic  violence  of 
other  objectors  to  established  faith. 

In  1726,  amid  the  storm  of  hostile  criticism,  there  appeared  on 
the  side  of  Collins  a  Moderator  between  an  Infidel  and  an  Apostate. 
This  was  Thomas  Woolston  (1669-1733),  Fellow  and  Tutor  of 
Sidney  Sussex,  Cambridge.  Woolston  had  long  made  theology 
his  favourite  study,  but  till  more  than  fifty  had  shown  no  symp- 
toms of  acute  heterodoxy.  He  had  indeed  taken  up  Origen's 
view  of  the  Old  Testament  as  a  spiritual  allegory,  and  in  1723 
had  made  acrimonious  attacks  on  the  clergy.  But  now  he  pushed 
the  iilea  of  allegory  into  the  New  Testament,  maintaining  that  the 
miracles  also  were  fictitious  allegories.  In  the  four  following 
years,  in  'Six  Discourses  on  the  Miracles  of  Christ,'  he  assailed 
the  gospel  narrative  with  ridicule.  He  also  issued  some  ironical 


404  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

defences  of  Christian  tenets.     His  manner  was  offensive ;  he  was 
prosecuted  for  blasphemy,  fined,  and  imprisoned. 

In  the  last  year  of  this  period,  1730,  Matthew  Tindal  (1657- 
1733),  a  Fellow  of  All  Souls,  published  a  dialogue,  'Christianity 
as  old  as  the  Creation,  or  the  Gospel  a  republication  of  the  Re- 
li.ion  of  Nature.'  This  is  perhaps  the  most  elaborate  of  the 
deist ical  works  of  the  period.  The  author  holds  the  startling 
dm  trine  that  Christianity  is  useless  where  it  is  not  mischievous; 
that  man  has  always  been  able  to  distinguish  right  and  wrong 
with  regard  to  his  special  circumstances;  and  that  to  lay  down  a 
system  of  general  rules  is  certain  to  conduct  to  error. 

The  Deists  were  opposed  by  the  whole  force  of  the  clergy,  as 
well  as  by  a  considerable  number  of  laymen.  Among  those  that 
more  particularly  distinguished  themselves  —  apart  from  such 
champions  as  Hoadley,  Clarke,  and  Bentley,  who  achieved  dis- 
tinction in  other  fields — may  be  mentioned  Charles  Leslie  (1650- 
1722),  author  of  a  famous  work  provoked  chiefly  by  Toland,  en- 
titled 'Short  and  Easy  Method  with  the  Deists';  John  Norris 
(1657-1711),  rector  of  Bemerton,  one  of  the  earliest  critics  of  Locke, 
who  replied  to  'Poland's  'Christianity  not  Mysterious';  Peter 
Brown,  Bishop  of  Cork,  also  a  critic  of  Locke  and  Toland; 
Edward  Chandler  (d.  1750),  Bishop  of  Lichfield,  who  in  1725 
wrote  a  '  Defence  of  Christianity '  against  Collins  ;  Thomas  Sher- 
lock (1678-1761),  Bishop  of  London,  who  wrote  a  'Trial  of  the 
Witnesses  of  the  Resurrection  of  Jesus '  in  reply  to  Woolston. 
But  the  most  able  apologists  belong  to  our  next  period;  they 
came  forward  to  repel  the  assault  made  by  Tindal.  The  fight 
began  to  rage  hotly  about  1720,  after  the  subsidence  of  the  Ban- 
gorian  controversy ;  Tindal's  work  was  the  culminating  charge, 
after  which  the  battle  became  fainter. 


PHILOSOPHY. 

Bernard  de  Mandeville  (1670-1733)  is  famed  as  the  author  of 
'The  Fable  of  the  Bees,  or  private  Vices  public  Benefits.' l  "  This 
work  is  a  satire  upon  artificial  society,  having  for  its  chief  aim  to 
expose  the  hollowness  of  the  so-called  dignity  of  human  nature." 
He  endeavours  with  cynical  humour  to  explain  away  all  alleged 
cases  of  disinterested  conduct.  He  regards  pride  and  vanity  aa 

1  The  received  bibliography  of  this  Fable  is  inaccurate.  It  appeared  originally 
in  1705  (not  in  1714,  the  received  date),  as  a  small  sixpenny  pamphlet  of  doggerel 
verses,  entitled  '  The  Grumbling  Hive  ;  or  Knaves  turned  Honest.1  Soon  after, 
it  was  pirated,  and  hawked  about  the  streets  in  a  halfpenny  sheet.  In  1714  the 
author  repulilished  it  with  some  two  hundred  small  pages  of  remarks,  and  an 
'  Kn«|uiry  into  the  Origin  of  Moral  Virtue:' — the  whole  under  the  title — "The 
Falile  of  tlie  Bees,  or  private  Vices  public  Benefits.'  In  1723  the  work  was  en- 
tirely recast,  but  the  title,  '  The  Fable  of  the  Bees,'  was  not  then  given  to  it  for 
the  lirst  time. 


PHILOSOPHY.  405 

the  chief  incentives  that  delude  men  into  what  is  called  public 
spirit.  His  humour  is  the  coarsest  of  the  coarse ;  but  he  cannot 
be  denied  great  wit,  happy  expression,  and  ingenious  illustrations. 
A  happy  saying  of  his  stuck  to  Addison — "a  parson  in  a  tye-wig"; 
•which  has  much  the  same  force  as  our  familiar  "a  policeman  in  plain 
clothes,"  the  tye-wig  being  unclerical  in  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne. 
William  Wollaston  (1659-1724),  a  clergyman,  was  bequeathed 
an  ample  fortune  when  he  was  about  thirty,  settled  in  London, 
and  passed  a  life  of  study — so  very  regular  that  he  is  said  not  to 
have  slept  out  of  his  own  house  for  thirty  years.  Roused,  like 
Clarke,  by  the  ethics  of  Hobbes,  he  wrote  a  treatise  entitled  '  The 
Religion  of  Nature  Delineated.'  His  ethical  system  is  at  bottom 
the  same  with  Clarke's,  though  differently  expressed.  According 
to  him,  immorality  consists  in  the  violation  of  truth,  truth  con- 
sisting in  the  observance  of  certain  eternally  fixed  relations  be- 
tween man  and  man  and  between  man  and  God. 

Anthony  Ashley  Cooper,  third  Earl  of  Shaftesbury,  grandson 
of  the  first  Earl  ("  Achitophel ")  (1671-1713),  made  a  considerable 
reputation  as  an  ethical  writer.  He  wa^fe  for  a  few  years  in  Parlia- 
ment, but  the  greater  part  of  his  life  was  spent  in  study.  His 
works  are, — 'Inquiry  concerning  Virtue'  (1699) ;  'Letter  on  En- 
thusiasm' (1708);  'Moralists,  a  Philosophical  Rhapsody' — a 
Platonic  vindication  of  Deity  and  Providence,  highly  praised  by 
Leibnitz  (1709);  'Essay  upon  the  Freedom  of  Wit  and  Humour' 
— advocating  the  trial  of  religious  as  well  as  other  doctrines  by 
the  test  of  ridicule  (also  1709);  'Advice  to  an  Author'  (1710). 
The  title  of  his  collected  works,  excluding  the  '  Inquiry,'  which 
contains  his  ethical  theories,  is  '  Characteristics  of  Men,  Manners, 
Opinions,  and  Times.'  He  was  a  man  of  feeble  constitution,  but 
cheerful  and  witty.  His  ethical  speculations  show  no  great  power 
of  analysis.  He  may  be  called  the  first  of  the  intuitional  schooL 
writing  without  being  at  all  aware  of  the  difficulties  of  his  position, 
Cudworth  had  been  alarmed  at  the  attempt  of  Hobbes  to  restrict 
the  term  moral  to  actions  commanded  by  a  supreme  power; 
Shaftesbury  disliked  Locke's  theory  that  our  ideas  of  morality  are 
got  by  reflection  upon  our  experience.  He  calls  himself  a  Moral 
Realist;  and  holds  not  only  that  the  distinctions  between  virtue 
and  vice  are  "  real,"  but  that  we  have  a  special  moral  sense,  where- 
by we  distinguish  what  is  virtuous  and  what  is  vicious.  Into  the 
origin  of  this  sense  he  does  not  profess  to  inquira — His  style  is 
highly  elaborated.  His  first  care  is  to  be  delicately  melodious. 
He  strives  also  to  avoid  the  very  appearance  of  harshness  in  the 
union  of  ideas.  As  a  consequence,  he  is  rather  wanting  in  vigour, 
is  driven  upon  affected  inversions,  and  is  obliged  often  to  prolong 
his  sentences  to  a  tedious  length  before  his  smooth  circumlocution! 
amount  to  a  complete  expression. 


406  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

George  Berkeley  (1684-1753\  Bishop  of  Cloyne,  established  him- 
self in  a  high  philosophical  reputation.  Bora  in  Ireland,  he  was 
educated  at  Kilkenny  School  and  at  Trinity  College,  Dublin.  A 
precocious  youth,  he  published  his  first  work  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
three — '  An  Attempt  to  demonstrate  Arithmetic  without  the  aid  of 
Algebra  or  Geometry.'  In  1709  (at  age  twenty-five)  he  wrote  his 
first  psychological  work,  '  The  Theory  of  Vision,'  remarkable  as  the 
earliest  attempt  to  distinguish  in  an  act  of  vision  between  what  we 
actually  see  with  the  eye  and  what  we  supply  from  former  experi- 
ence. In  the  following  year  (1710)  he  published  his  'Principles 
of  Human  Knowledge,'  containing  views  so  original  that  they — or 
at  least  misconceptions  of  them — have  become  identified  with  his 
name.  The  popular  notion  was  that  he  denied  the  existence  of 
"  Matter  " ;  and  this  current  misconception  was  not  in  the  least 
modified  by  his  repeated  protests  that  what  he  denied  the  exist- 
ence of  was  matter  in  the  metaphysical  sense,  not  matter  as 
understood  by  plain  men.  After  the  age  of  twenty-seven,  he 
published  no  further  novelty  in  psychology,  although  in  some 
of  his  other  works  he  expounded  his  Idealism  at  greater  length. 
He  wrote  in  favour  of  passive  obedience  and  non-resistance; 
travelled  on  the  Continent ;  and  is  said  to  have  literally  been 
the  death  of  Malebranche  in  Paris,  arguing  with  that  phil- 
osopher while  he  was  suffering  from  inflammation  of  the  lungs. 
About  1722  he  became  acquainted  with  Miss  Vanhomrigh,  Swift's 
Vanessa,  who  left  him  half  of  her  fortune.  In  1728  he  set  out  on 
a  philanthropic  scheme  to  convert  the  American  Indians  to  Chris- 
tianity by  establishing  a  college  in  the  Bermudas.  This  scheme 
failing  through  breach  of  faith  on  the  part  of  Sir  R  Walpole, 
Berkeley  returned,  and  was  soon  preferred  to  the  see  of  Cloyne. 
He  took  part  in  the  deistic  controversy;  his  'Minute  Philosopher* 
is  a  most  acute  attack  on  the  deistic  positions. — He  is  described 
as  "a  handsome  man,  with  a  countenance  full  of  meaning  and 
benignity,  remarkable  for  great  strength  of  limbs;  and,  till  his 
sedentary  life  impaired  it,  of  a  very  robust  constitution."  The 
characteristic  of  his  intellect  was  extraordinary  subtlety  rather  than 
solid  judgment.  He  had,  perhaps,  too  warm  an  imagination  to 
arrive  at  sound  and  sober  conclusions.  Something  of  this  caprice 
of  imagination  appears  in  his  conduct ;  contrast  his  philandering 
scheme  to  convert  the  Indians  with  morose  Swift's  endeavours  to 
improve  the  condition  of  the  Irish  peasants.  Berkeley,  too,  was 
an  Irish  clergyman ;  and  in  the  elevation  of  his  parishioners 
might  have  found  an  ample  field  for  the  strongest  "  enthusiasm 
of  humanity."  His  style  lias  always  been  esteemed  admirable; 
Bim  pie,  felicitous,  and  sweetly  melodious.  The  dialogues  are  sus- 
tained with  great  skill 


HISTORY.  407 


HISTORY. 

There  is  no  historian  of  any  note  in  this  period.  Lawrence 
Echard  (1671-1730),  an  English  clergyman,  wrote  several  histori- 
cal works,  but  none  of  them  have  kept  a  place  among  general 
readers.  His  'History  of  Rome,'  'General  Ecclesiastical  History,' 
and  '  History  of  England  to  the  Revolution,'  all  obtained  consider- 
able praise  and  circulation  in  their  day,  but  have  been  superseded 
by  the  works  of  more  eminent  writers. 

The  most  famous  ANTIQUARY  of  the  period  is  John  Strype 
(1643-1737),  a  most  industrious  collector  of  ecclesiastical  anti- 
quities relating  to  the  Reformation  in  England :  author  of  '  An- 
nals of  the  Reformation,'  and  of  separate  'Lives'  of  the  various 
founders  of  the  Anglican  Church. 

With  Strype  may  be  mentioned  Dr  Humphrey  Prideaux  (1648- 
1724),  author  of  a  'Connection  of  the  History  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testament'  (1715-17),  a  work  still  used  by  students  of  divinity. 
He  wrote  also  a  highly  popular  'Life  of  Mahomet'  (1707),  and 
other  works. 

Dr  Potter  (1674-1747),  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  wrote  a 
manual  of  the  'Antiquities  of  Greece,'  which  was  the  standard 
work  among  students  until  superseded  in  some  points  by  more 
thorough  researches.  Basil  Kennett  (1674-1714)  wrote  a  similar 
work  on  '  Roman  Antiquities,'  which  held  its  ground  for  nearly  a 
century. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

Richard  Bentley  (1662-1742)  is  one  of  the  most  famous  of 
English  critics.  He  was  a  graduate  of  Cambridge.  In  1693 
he  published  sermons  against  atheism,  which  he  had  preached 
as  Boyle  Lecturer.  About  this  time  he  was  appointed  Keeper 
of  the  Royal  Library  of  St  James.  When  Charles  Boyle  pub- 
lished his  edition  of  'Phalaris,'  he  animadverted  on  the  in- 
civility of  Bentley  in  suddenly  recalling  a  book  that  he  had 
borrowed  from  the  library.  Bentley  took  pungent  notice  of 
this,  and  of  the  general  value  of  the  'Epistles  of  Phalaris,'  in 
a  dissertation  appended  to  Wotton's  'Reflections  on  Temple's 
Ancient  and  Modern  Learning'  (1697).  This  was  the  begin- 
ning of  the  famous  controversy  burlesqued  by  Swift  in  his 
'Battle  of  the  Books.'  Boyle,  with  the  assistance  of  Atterbury 
and  Aldrich,  replied  to  the  dissertation,  and  was  thought  to  have 
demolished  his  antagonist.  But  Bentley,  after  two  years'  silence, 
came  forward  with  an  irrefragably  thorough  exposure  of  the 
spuriousness  of  the  Letters,  seasoned  with'  the  most  cutting  and 
unsparing  ridicule  of  his  opponents.  There  had  never  been  in 


408  'FROM   1700  TO    1730. 

English  criticism  such  a  display  of  scholarship  and  arrogant  wit ; 
and  Bentley's  fame  was  at  once  established.  His  other  great 
performance  was  an  attack  on  Collins,  under  the  name  of  '  Philel- 
eutherus  Lipsiensis,'  pointing  out  that  the  text  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment is  less  corrupt  than  the  text  of  any  classical  author,  and 
exulting  in  the  Free-thinker's  unscholarly  mistakes.  Bentley  was 
a  man  of  imperious  and  capricious  temper;  .and,  as  Master  of 
Trinity,  Cambridge,  was  involved  in  constant  squabbles  with  the 
Fellows.  His  critical  scholarship  is  universally  allowed  to  have 
been  prodigious.  His  sagacity  in  textual  emendations  is  also 
highly  extolled,  though  with  the  qualification  that  he  is  too 
bold.  We  laugh  at  many  of  his  courageous  liberties  with  the 
text  of  Milton ;  a  Roman  might  have  been  equally  amused  with 
some  of  his  emendations  of  Horace.  His  style  has  surprising 
force  and  wit,  formed  upon  the  scholastic  models  of  unsparingly 
personal  acrimony.  The  times  allowed  great  freedom  of  abuse 
in  controversy,  and  Bentley's  natural  temper  had  full  scope. 

The  two  principal  coadjutors  of  Addison  and  Steele  in  the 
'  Spectator '  were  John  Hughes  (1667-1720)  and  Eustace  Budgell 
(1685-1737).  Both  held  Government  appointments.  Hughes  was 
a  refined  poetical  soul,  wrote  poems  and  dramas,  and  translated 
from  Latin,  French,  and  Italian  polite  literature.  His  papers  in 
the  '  Spectator '  approach  very  near  to  Addison's  in  finish  and 
happy  expression.  The  difference  between  them  lies  chiefly  in 
simplicity.  Hughes  has  longer  and  more  involved  sentences,  and 
clogs  the  smooth  flow  of  his  rhythm  with  a  greater  number  of 
epithets.  —  Budgell  was  a  rough,  vigorous,  dissipated  barrister, 
who  preferred  making  a  figure  in  the  coffee-houses  and  in  litera- 
ture to  the  practice  of  his  profession.  His  humour  is  compara- 
tively obstreperous,  of  the  Defoe  and  Macaulay  type,  which  the 
French  seem  to  consider  peculiarly  English.  It  is  genial  rather 
from  the  author's  hearty  enjoyment  of  the  fun  he  is  making  than 
from  any  sympathy  with  the  objects  of  his  derision.  The  '  She 
Komp  Club '  and  the  rural  sports  of  Sir  Roger  are  from  his  pen. 
He  came  to  an  unfortunate  end.  Tindal,  the  deist,  having  be- 
queathed him  £2000,  he  was  suspected  of  having  tampered  with 
the  will ;  and,  unable  to  bear  the  disgrace  of  such  a  suspicion, 
committed  suicide  by  throwing  himself  into  the  Thames. 

Over  against  these  literary  Whigs  may  be  mentioned  the  literary 
Tories,  the  associates  of  Swift  in  the  'Examiner'  and  elsewhere. 
Passing  over  Mrs  Manley,  the  novelist,  who  conducted  the  '  Ex- 
aminer' after  Swift,  and  who  had  been  prosecuted  for  a  satire 
on  the  Whig  statesmen,  we  may  single  out  Dr  John  Arbuthnot 
(1667-1735)  as  being,  next  to  Swift,  and  excluding  Pope,  by  far 
the  ablest  writer  on  the  Tory  side.  His  best  performance,  'The 
History  of  John  Bull/  a  satire  on  Marlboiough  and  the  war,  was 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITERS.  409 

ascribed  to  Swift,  and  is  usually  printed  among  Swift's  works. 
Swift  said  of  him — "  He  has  more  wit  than  we  all  have,  and  his 
humanity  is  equal  to  his  wit"  Arbuthnotwas  one  of  the  northern 
Scots  that  were  now  beginning  to  push  their  fortunes  in  London. 
He  was  born  in  Kincardineshire,  at  a  town  of  his  own  name,  and 
studied  medicine  in  Aberdeen.  Immediately  after  completing  his 
studies  he  went  to  London,  and  made  a  rrvelihood  at  first  by 
teaching  mathematics.  He  soon  brought  himself  into  notice  by 
some  tracts  on  mathematical  and  medical  subjects.  In  1705  he 
was  appointed  physician  extraordinary  to  Queen  Anne;  in  1709 
physician  ordinary.  He  became  a  leading  wit  in  the  coffee- 
houses. When  Swift  came  over  from  Ireland  in  1708,  and  the 
Tories  concerted  a  grand  assault  upon  the  Whigs,  Arbuthnot's 
ready  pen  supplied  some  of  the  most  effective  missiles  of  offence. 
The  '  History  of  John  Bull '  by  Arbuthnot,  the  '  Conduct  of  the 
Allies '  by  Swift,  and  '  The  Defence  of  Sacheverell '  by  Atterbury, 
were  the  three  great  literary  contributions  to  the  fall  of  the  Whig 
Government :  the  eulogist  of  Arbuthnot  usually  gives  the  honour 
to  Arbuthnot's  performance,  the  eulogist  of  Swift  to  Swift's,  the 
eulogist  of  Atterbury  to  Atterbury's.  Arbuthnot's  other  great 
production  is  his  share  in  the  writings  of  '  Martinus  Scriblerus,' 
sometimes  printed  with  Swift's  works,  sometimes  with  Pope's. 
The  Scriblerus  Club  was  instituted  in  1714  by  Pope,  Swift, 
Arbuthnot,  Gay,  Parnell,  Atterbury,  Congreve,  and  others.  The 
object  was  to  satirise  the  absurdities  of  literature.  The  members 
were  actuated  a  good  deal  by  the  spirit  of  Pope's  'Dunciad.' 
Arbuthnot  bore  a  large  share  in  the  works  published  under  the 
signature  of  Scriblerus.  In  the  essay  on  the  '  Art  of  Sinking,' 
his  hand  can  be  traced  in  several  of  the  chapters. — Arbuthnot's 
fortunes  declined  at  the  accession  of  George,  and  his  later  days 
were  made  unhappy  by  poverty  and  ill-health. — There  is  no  col- 
lected edition  of  his  works.  The  '  John  Bull '  is  usually  printed 
in  Swift's  works,  the  '  Scriblerus '  papers  partly  in  Swift's,  partly 
in  Pope's.  He  was  exceedingly  careless  of  what  he  wrote ;  all 
was  done  to  serve  a  passing  purpose,  and  he  took  no  pains  to 
preserve  either  manuscript  or  print.  He  must  have  been  a  man 
of  great  social  tact  and  amiability.  Swift  seems  to  have  loved 
him  like  a  brother  —  "If  the  world  had  a  dozen  Arbuthnots 
in  it,"  he  wrote  in  one  of  his  letters,  "I  would  burn  my  Travels," 
The  power  of  his  satire  was  proved  by  its  effects.  He  is  the  most 
versatile,  as  regards  mood,  of  all  the  great  wits  of  the  period. 
When  his  feelings  are  not  specially  roused  he  is  genial,  lambent, 
good-humoured ;  but  he  was  capable  of  genuine  indignation,  and 
sometimes  lays  on  the  lash  with  unsparing  severity.  His  paper 
on  the  'Altercation  or  Scolding  of  the  Ancients'  is  in  very  happy 
humour ;  his  '  Art  of  Political  Lying '  is  more  sarcastic ;  and  some 


410  FROM   1700  TO   1730. 

sallies  usually  attributed  to  him  against  Bishop  Burnet,  the  favour 
ite  butt  of  Swift,  are  worthy  of  the  savage  Dean  himself. 

One  imposing  figure  in  the  public  transactions  of  the  time  also 
demands  a  high  place  in  the  history  of  our  literature — Henry  St 
John,  Viscount  Bolingbroke  (1678-1751).  His  chief  philosophical 
and  political  works  were  written  during  the  forced  inaction  of  the 
latter  half  of  his  life,  and  in  this  manual  he  should,  in  strict 
method,  be  placed  in  the  following  generation ;  but  he  is  so  thor- 
oughly identified  with  the  Queen  Anne  men  that  it  would  be 
an  unprofitable  violation  of  the  usual  arrangement  not  to  mention 
him  here. 

Entering  Parliament  in  1701  at  the  age  of  twenty-three,  he  had 
not  to  watch  and  wait  for  distinction  ;  his  splendid  powers  placed 
him  at  once  in  the  front  rank.  He  gained  a  seat  in  the  Cabinet  in 
1704  as  Secretary  at  War,  and  remained  in  office  four  years.  Dur- 
ing the  four  last  years  of  Queen  Anne,  he  and  Harley  were  the 
leaders  of  the  Administration.  He  quarrelled  with  Harley,  and 
supplanted  him  as  formal  head  of  the  Government  about  a  week 
before  the  Queen's  death.  With  the  death  of  the  Queen  his 
power  came  to  an  end :  he  was  suspected  of  having  intrigued  for 
the  succession  of  the  Pretender  Prince,  and  had  to  flee  the  country. 
For  some  time  he  \\  as  secretary  to  the  Pretender ;  and,  turning  to 
literary  composition,  produced  '  Reflections  on  Exile,'  and  a  defence 
of  his  conduct  in  the  form  of  a  letter  to  Sir  William  Wyndhanx 
After  seven  years'  exile,  he  was  permitted  to  return,  but  was  not 
suffered  to  resume  his  place  in  the  House  of  Lords.  Upon  his  re- 
turn he  wrote  in  the  '  Craftsman '  a  series  of  letters,  afterwards 
reprinted  as  'A  Dissertation  on  Parties,'  and  busied  himself  with 
other  studies  and  writings.  In  1735  ne  weQt  to  France,  this  time 
voluntarily,  and  lived  there  for  seven  years,  during  which  he  pub- 
lished 'Letters  on  the  Study  of  History'  and  a  'Letter  on  the 
True  Use  of  Retirement.'  On  his  final  return  to  England  in 
1742,  he  settled  at  Battersea ;  wrote  'Letters  on  the  Spirit  of 
Patriotism  ' ;  the  '  Idea  of  a  Patriot  King'  (pub.  in  1749)  ;  and  the 
various  philosophical  and  other  works  published  after  his  death  by 
his  literary  executor,  David  Mallet. — Much  has  been  said  of  the 
splendid  personality  of  Bolingbroke.  Pope  gave  poetic  expression 
to  a  very  general  feeling  when  he  said  that,  on  the  appearance  of 
a  comet,  he  could  not  help  thinking  that  it  had  been  sent  as  a 
chariot  to  take  his  friend  St  John  away.  "  Nature,"  writes 
Goldsmith,  "seemed  not  less  kind  to  him  in  her  external  em- 
bellishments, than  in  adorning  his  mind.  With  the  graces  of 
a  handsome  person,  and  a  face  in  which  dignity  was  happily 
blended  with  sweetness,  he  had  a  manner  of  address  that  was 
very  engaging.  His  vivacity  was  always  awake,  his  apprehen- 
sion was  quick,  his  wit  refined,  and  his  memory  amazing;  his 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  411 

subtlety  in  thinking  and  reasoning  was  profound ;  and  all  these 
talents  were  adorned  with  an  elocution  that  was  irresistible." 
His  constitutional  energy  was  prodigious,  appearing  in  the  wild 
excesses  of  his  dissolute  youth,  no  less  than  in  his  hard  work  and 
complicated  intrigues  as  a  Minister  of  State.  The  most  striking 
feature  of  his  style  is  splendour  of  declamation.  All  his  works, 
philosophical  as  well  as  political,  are  written  in  a  declamatory 
strain,  and  read  like  elaborate  speeches.  Not  only  have  the 
words  an  oratorical  glow  and  vehemence,  but  the  general  structure 
is  the  structure  of  spoken  rather  than  of  written  style.  The  dedi- 
cation of  his  'Dissertation  on  Parties,'  addressed  to  Sir  Robert 
Walpole,  is  an  extreme  example: — 

"  Let  me  now  appeal  to  you,  sir.  Are  these  designs  which  any  man,  who 
is  born  a  Briton,  in  any  circumstances,  in  any  situation,  ought  to  be 
ashamed  or  afraid  to  avow?  You  cannot  tliiuk  it.  You  will  not  say  it. 
That  never  can  be  the  case,  until  we  cease  to  think  like  freemen,  as  well  as 
to  be  free.  Are  these  designs  in  favour  of  the  Pretender?  I  appeal  to  the 
whole  world;  and  I  scorn  with  a  just  indignation  to  give  any  other  answer 
to  so  shameless  and  so  senseless  an  objection.  No;  they  are  designs  in 
favour  of  the  constitution  ;  designs  to  secure,  to  fortify,  to  perpetuate  that 
excellent  system  of  government.  1  court  no  other  cause  ;  I  claim  no  other 
merit " 

Here  not  only  the  vehement  eloquence,  but  the  short  sentences, 
the  pointed  balance,  the  repetition  of  tiie  leading  word  (as  in 
"designs"),  the  figures  of  interrogation  and  exclamation — all 
belong  to  oratory.  We  meet  some  or  all  of  these  characteristics 
in  every  page.  Although,  however,  in  almost  every  page  we 
meet  with  the  short  oratorical  sentence  familiar  to  readers  of 
Macaulay,  his  sentences  are  not  in  general  so  short  as  in  the 
above  extract  On  the  contrary,  he  is  rather  famous  for  long 
sentences — remarkable  on  this  ground,  that  the  conclusion  of  the 
predicate  is  put  off  by  one  clause  after  another,  and  yet  these 
clauses  are  so  admirably  placed  that  there  is  seldom  the  least 
confusion.  The  structure  of  these  long  sentences  is  all  the  more 
simple,  that  very  often  the  latter  part  is  a  paraphrase  or  extension 
in  apposition  to  some  word  in  the  former  part.  Thus — 

"  How  different  the  case  is,  on  the  other  side,  will  appear  not  only  from 
the  actions,  but  from  the  principles  of  the  Court  party,  as  we  find  them 
avowed  in  their  writings ;  principles  more  dangerous  to  liberty,  though  not 
^0  directly,  nor  so  openly  levelled  against  it,  than  even  any  of  those,  bad  as 
they  were,  which  some  of  these  men  value  themselves  for  having  formerly 
opposed." 

This  structure  is  also  oratorical.1     To  call  Bolingbroke  a  splendid 

1  In  singling  out  certain  features  of  Bolingbroke's  style  as  oratorical,  I  do  not 
mean  to  imply  that  these  are  confined  to  oratory.  I  call  them  oratorical  because 
they  are  such  as  occur  in  nearly  every  Parliamentary  speech  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  and  because  they  are  peculiarly  litUxl  to  spokeu  address. 


412  FEOM   1700  TO   1730. 

declaimer  is  to  give  him  little  more  than  half  his  due.  He  is 
also  a  wit;  and  at  every  turn  he  electrifies  the  reader  with  some 
felicitous  stroke  of  brevity,  or  happy  adjustment  of  words  to  ias 
meaning. 

To  enumerate  all  the  miscellaneovs  writers  of  this  time  would 
be  as  much  out  of  place  in  the  present  work  as  to  enumerate  all 
that  have  written  to  newspapers  or  magazines  within  the  nine- 
teenth century.  A  great  many  periodicals,  weekly,  bi-weekly, 
or  daily,  some  continued  for  a  few  weeks,  some  for  one  or  two 
years,  were  published  contemporaneously  with,  and  after  the 
decease  of,  Defoe's  '  Review ' ;  Steele's  '  Tatler,1  '  Spectator,'  and 
'  Guardian ' ;  and  Swift's  '  Examiner.'  A  long  list  is  given  in 
the  beginning  of  voL  iv.  of  Drake's  Essays  on  Steele,  Addison, 
and  Johnson.  The  names  that  we  meet  with  a're  such  as — '  The 
Re-Tatler';  'The  Female  Tatler';  'The  Tory  Tatler';  'The 
Grumbler';  'The  Medley'  (conducted  by  an  accomplished  man, 
Mr  Maynwaring) ;  '  The  Lay  Monastery '  (conducted  by  the  poet 
Sir  Richard  Blackmore);  'The  Censor'  (conducted  by  Lewis 
Theobald,  the  annotator  of  Shakspeare);  'The  Free-thinker '  (sup- 
ported by  Ambrose  Phillips,  the  friend  of  Addison,  and  George 
Stubbs,  a  scholarly  elegant  recluse  clergyman)  ;  '  The  Plain 
Dealer '  (started  by  Aaron  Hill) ;  '  The  Intelligencer '  (by  Dr 
Sheridan,  the  friend  and  biographer  of  Swift).  Most  of  the 
periodicals  of  the  day  were  political ;  others  diversified  politics 
with  literature,  on  the  plan  of  the  '  Review ' ;  and  some  con- 
sisted of  a  few  numbers  directed  against  an  object  of  aversion 
in  literature,  manners,  or  even  commerce.  Periodicals  were  the 
fashion,  most  of  them  very  short-lived.  A  periodical  sheet  was 
started  to  vent  an  opinion  that,  in  the  present  day,  would  be 
expressed  in  a  letter,  or  a  series  of  letters,  to  a  daily  newspaper ; 
and  expired  either  when  the  author  had  exhausted  the  idea,  or 
when  the  public  had  received  enough  and  refused  to  purchase 
more. 


CHAPTER     VIL 


FROM    1730   TO    1760. 


SAMUEL      JOHNSOTT, 
1709—1784. 

THE  great  "Moralist"  and  "Lexicographer"  was  the  son  of  a 
respectable  bookseller  in  Lichfield,  where  he  was  born  on  the  i8th 
of  September.  The  mistress  of  a  dame's  school  there  praised  him 
as  the  best  scholar  she  ever  had.  After  five  years  at  a  higher 
school  in  Lichfield,  one  year  at  the  school  of  Stourbridge,  and  two 
years  loitering  at  home,  he  was  sent,  at  the  age  of  nineteen,  to 
Pembroke  College,  Oxford.  He  was  too  desultory  to  confine  him- 
self to  the  studies  of  the  place,  and  continued  in  the  library  of  the 
college  the  wide  miscellaneous  reading  he  had  practised  in  his 
father's  shop.  Yet  his  fluent  command  of  Latin  procured  him 
marked  attention.  A  Latin  hexameter  version  of  Pope's  '  Messiah,' 
which  he  executed  as  a  Christmas  exercise,  was  considered  so  good 
that  Pope  is  said  to  have  declared  that  posterity  would  be  in  doubt 
which  was  the  original  and  which  the  translation.  Owing  to 
poverty,  he  left  Oxford  in  1731  without  taking  a  degree.  Too 
constitutionally  irregular  to  settle  down  to  a  profession,  he  lived 
at  home  for  several  months  ;  acted  for  several  months  as  an  usher ; 
lived  with  a  friend  in  Birmingham ;  translated  for  a  Birmingham 
bookseller  '  Lobo's  Journey  to  Abyssinia '  (pub.  in  1735);  returned 
to  Lichfield ;  married  Mrs  Porter  of  Birmingham,  a  widow  with 
;£8oo ;  and  set  up  a  boarding-school  near  Lichfield.  Finally,  the 
school  not  succeeding,  he  removed  to  London  in  1737,  and  for  the 
next  quarter  of  a  century  maintained  himself  by  his  pen. 

Hud  he  been  born  a  generation  sooner,  and  gone  to  London  in 


414  FROM  1730  TO   1760. 

the  reign  of  Queen  Anne,  he  might  have  been  retained  as  a  party- 
writer,  and  well  rewarded.  Bolingbroke  or  Harley  might  have 
employed  him  to  abuse  Maryborough  or  browbeat  the  'Freeholder.' 
But  in  1737  party-writers  were  not  in  demand  The  man  of 
letters  might  possibly  meet  with  a  wealthy  patron,  but  his  trust 
was  chiefly  in  the  booksellers,  who  were  beginning  to  compete  for 
the  favour  of  the  public  with  periodicals,  editions,  translations, 
and  every  sort  of  compilation  that  was  likely  to  sell.  There  was 
plenty  of  employment,  though  at  a  low  rate  of  remuneration,  for 
men  of  ability ;  and  had  Johnson  possessed  ordinary  business 
habits  and  industry,  he  might  have  lived  comfortably.  During 
the  first  ten  years  of  his  London  life  he  wrote  chiefly  for  CAVE, 
the  publisher  of  the  '  Gentleman's  Magazine '  (established  in  1731), 
composing  prefaces,  lives  of  eminent  men,  abridgments,  and  mis- 
cellaneous papers.  He  succeeded  William  Guthrie  as  writer  of  the 
Parliamentary  Debates  (which  were  forbidden  to  be  reported,  but 
which  Cave  introduced  into  his  Magazine  as  the  proceedings  of 
the  Senate  of  Lilliput,  sending  men  to  the  House  to  bring  away 
what  they  could  remember,  and  getting  a  clever  man  to  compose 
speeches  according  to  their  reports).  In  1738  he  published  his 
poem  "London."  In  1747  his  fame  was  well  established,  and  he 
was  engaged  by  a  combination  of  London  booksellers  for  ^1575 
to  prepare  his  famous  Dictionary.  In  1750,  before  this  was  com- 
pleted, he  began  the  work  that  raised  his  fame  to  its  full  height,  a 
periodical  under  the  title  of  'The  Rambler.'  This  he  carried  on 
single-handed  twice  a- week  for  two  years.  In  1753  he  made 
several  contributions  to  'The  Adventurer.'  The  Dictionary  was 
completed  in  1755  ;  and,  to  grace  his  name  on  the  title-page, 
the  University  of  Oxford  presented  him  with  the  degree  of  M.A. 
Thereafter  he  continued  his  multifarious  writings  for  a  livelihood. 
In  1756  he  wrote  several  reviews  and  other  papers  for  the  newly 
started  '  Literary  Magazine.'  From  1758  to  1760  he  wrote  the 
papers  known  as  'The  Idler'  for  Payne's  'Universal  Chronicla' 
In  1759  he  wrote  'Rasselas.' 

The  year  1762  relieved  him  from  his  quarter  of  a  century  of 
literary  drudgery,  bringing  him  from  Government  an  annual  pen- 
sion of  ^300.  From  that  date  he  wrote  comparatively  little ; 
his  chief  productions  were  the  Notes  to  his  edition  of  Shakspeare, 
1765  ;  his  'Journey  to  the  Western  Islands  of  Scotland,'  and 
'Taxation  no  Tyranny,'  1775;  and  the  last  and  best  of  his 
works,  '  The  Lives  of  the  Poets,'  prefixed  as  detached  Prefaces  to 
an  edition  of  the  English  Poets,  1779-81.  After  being  made 
independent  by  the  pension,  he  spent  a  great  part  of  his  time  in 
social  enjoyment,  becoming  the  conversational  oracle  of  a  circle 
of  distinguished  literary  friends.  In  1763  he  met  Boswell,  to 
whose  painstaking  record  he  is  mainly  indebted  for  the  perpetua- 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  415 

don  of  his  fame.  In  1764  he  founded  the  Literary  Club  (still 
existing),  which  met  every  Monday  at  the  Turk's  Head.  In  1765 
he  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  Thrales ;  dined  with  them  fre- 
quently ;  and  finally  came  to  be  considered  as  a  member  of  their 
family.  At  his  own  house  in  Bolt  Court,  where  Boswell  found 
him  on  his  return  from  the  Hebrides,  he  charitably  kept  a  number 
of  humble  dependants — Mrs  Williams,  Mrs  Desmoulins,  Dr  Robert 
Levett,  Black  Frank,  and  a  cat  called  Hodge.  Among  the  inti- 
mate associates  of  his  latter  years  were  Burke,  Goldsmith,  Gibbon, 
Topham  Beauclerk,  Langton,  Sir  John  Hawkins,  Sir  Joshua  Rey- 
nolds, Arthur  Murphy.  He  died  in  his  house  in  Bolt  Court. 

Johnson's  appearance  was  far  from  prepossessing.  "He  is, 
indeed,"  says  Miss  Burney,  "  very  ill-favoured.  He  has  naturally 
a  noble  figure,  tall,  stout,  grand,  and  authoritative ;  but  he  stoops 
horribly ;  his  back  is  quite  round,  his  mouth  is  continually  open- 
ing and  shutting  as  if  he  were  chewing  something ;  he  has  a 
singular  method  of  twirling  his  fingers  and  twisting  his  hands ; 
his  vast  body  is  in  constant  agitation,  see-sawing  backwards  and 
forwards ;  his  feet  are  never  for  a  moment  quiet ;  and  his  whole 
great  frame  looks  often  as  if  it  were  going  to  roll  itself  quite 
voluntarily  from  its  chair  to  the  floor."  One  of  his  cheeks  was 
disfigured  by  the  marks  of  scrofula;  and  his  face  showed  the 
peculiar  nervous  twitching  known  as  St  Vitus's  Dance.  His  gait 
was  rolling  and  clumsy ;  he  seemed  to  be  struggling  with  fetters. 

Along  with  the  scrofulous  taint,  he  had  inherited  from  his  father 
a  disposition  to  melancholy,  which  came  upon  him  in  cruel  fits. 
During  these  gloomy  seasons  he  was  more  imperious  and  irritable 
than  Swift.  He  had  inherited,  also,  a  deep-rooted  indolence  and  a 
hatred  of  regular  work.  His  ambition,  his  desire  to  excel,  was  not 
alone  sufficient  to  overcome  this  constitutional  indolence.  He 
needed  to  be  "  well  whipt "  at  school,  and  when  grown  to  man- 
hood he  did  little  more  than  enough  to  keep  himself  and  his  wife 
from  starving.  England  gave  him  but  "  fourpence-half penny  a- 
day,"  if  she  gave  him  no  more,  chiefly  because  he  was  too  lazy  to 
work  for  more. 

His  intellectual  powers  must  not  be  judged  by  what  he  produced. 
He  was  indolent  not  in  the  sense  of  dozing  away  his  time  without 
thinking  or  reading,  but  in  the  sense  of  being  averse  both  to  pro- 
ductive exertion  and  to  regular  application.  In  his  father's  shop 
at  Lichfield,  in  the  college  library  at  Pembroke,  and  in  arranging 
the  vast  Harleian  library  of  books  and  pamphlets,  he  was  thoroughly 
in  his  element;  ranging  with  luxurious  pleasure  from  book  to 
book,  and  insatiably  storing  up  miscellaneous  knowledge.  Partly 
in  consequence  of  thus  reserving  his  strength,  he  was  capable  of 
intense  concentration  when  he  did  apply  his  mind  to  production. 


416  FROM    1730  TO    1760. 

In  dashing  off  a  definition,  a  criticism,  or  a  general  precept,  he 
seized  with  great  force  upon  the  leading  features.  In  these  mo- 
ments of  intense  concentration,  he  had  the  power  of  doing  in  a 
wonderfully  short  time  what  Lord  Brougham  describes  as  seizing 
the  kernel  and  leaving  the  husk.  This  habit  of  making  short 
work  with  a  subject  gives  his  writings  their  most  distinctive  char- 
acter. The  bold  comprehensive  grasp,  right  usually  in  the  main, 
has  always  deeply  impressed  the  admirers  of  force.  On  the  other 
hand,  his  hardihood  in  making  untenably  sweeping  assertions,  his 
inevitable  omission  of  many  considerations  in  the  course  of  his 
intense  but  hurried  survey,  has  severely  tried  the  patience  of  the 
lovers  of  delicate  accuracy. 

His  naturally  powerful  reason  was  a  good  deal  clouded  by  vari- 
ous prejudices.  He  would  believe  no  good  either  of  republican  or 
of  infidel.  He  did  injustice  to  Milton ;  he  abused  Bolingbroke 
without  reading  him ;  and  Boswell  mentions  his  having  uttered 
about  Hume  a  remark  too  gross  to  be  committed  to  paper.  He 
hated  and  ridiculed  the  French  and  the  Scotch,  and  refused  to  be 
persuaded  that  anybody  could  live  happily  out  of  London.  In 
these  things,  as  in  many  others,  he  showed  gross  egotism  and  want 
of  sympathy.  Swift  was  not  more  overbearing  nor  more  intoler- 
ant of  contradiction.  He  had  a  peculiar  horror  of  death,  and  if 
anybody  was  said  to  feel  differently,  he  at  once  pronounced  them 
either  mad  or  mendacious.  He  was  a  humane,  warm-hearted  man, 
at  least  towards  cases  of  extreme  distress  brought  on  by  no  fault 
of  the  sufferer ;  he  opened  his  house  as  a  retreat  for  several  "  in- 
firm and  decayed  "  persons ;  amused  himself  with  their  quarrels, 
and  patiently  endured  their  caprices.  He  had  a  few  strong  attach- 
ments. But  even  in  his  displays  of  benevolence  and  kindly  affec- 
tion, you  see  his  natural  love  of  domineering ;  he  allowed  nobody 
but  himself  to  praise  his  favourites,  and  he  treated  them  roughly 
when  they  deviated  from  his  ideal  of  propriety.  He  was  fre- 
quently humorous  at  his  own  expense,  but  he  would  allow  nobody 
else  to  take  liberties  with  him ;  he  made  boisterous  mirth  at  the 
expense  of  certain  of  his  friends,  but  he  would  not  endure  that  the 
slightest  air  of  ridicule  should  be  thrown  upon  any  of  his  own 
sayings  or  doings.  Often  in  his  writings  he  enforced  the  "vanity 
of  human  wishes."  His  'Rasselas'  is  virtually  a  sermon  on  the 
impossibility  of  finding  perfect  happiness  in  this  world ;  one  of  its 
professed  objects  is  the  benevolent  achievement  of  damping  the 
ardour  of  youth.  Yet  when  anybody  else  ventured  to  complain 
in  his  presence,  he  was  ready  to  avow  that  the  world  is  a  very 
enjoyable  world,  and  to  denounce  all  complaints  as  mere  senti- 
mental whining. 

Though  renowned  as  a  biographer,  he  was  far  from  being  car- 
ried away  by  hero-worship.  He  is  rather  chary  than  enthusiastic 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  417 

in  his  allowance  of  merit,  and  scatters  without  mercy  any  air  ot 
romance  or  exaggeration  that  may  have  been  gathered  about  an 
eminent  name  by  the  zeal  of  admirers.  When  Sir  Thomas  Browne, 
whom  Johnson  is  said  to  have  admired  and  imitated,  declares  that 
"  his  life  has  been  a  miracle  of  thirty  years ;  which  to  relate  were 
not  history,  but  a  piece  of  poetry,  and  would  sound  like  a  fable," 
— Johnson  remarks  somewhat  sarcastically  that  "  self-love,  co- 
operating with  an  imagination  vigorous  and  fertile  as  that  of 
Browne's,  will  find  or  make  objects  of  astonishment  in  every 
man's  life." 

Opinions. — In  politics  Johnson  was  a  bigoted  Tory.  He  could 
not  repress  his  political  leanings  even  in  writing  the  definitions  for 
his  Dictionary.  When  writing  the  Parliamentary  Debates  for 
Cave,  he  "  took  care  that  the  Whig  dogs  should  not  have  the  best 
of  it"  He  wrote  little  in  direct  support  of  the  Tories.  After  he 
received  his  pension  he  conceived  himself  bound  to  do  something, 
and  composed  a  few  pamphlets — '  The  False  Alarm,'  '  The  Falk- 
land Islands,'  'The  Patriot,'  and  'Taxation  no  Tyranny.'  In 
these  he  stated  his  views  of  true  liberty  and  true  patriotism,  and 
maintained  that  the  English  Parliament  had  a  right  to  tax  the 
Americans  without  their  consent. 

Naturally  a  pious  man,  he  was  a  bigoted  Churchman.  He  hated 
Dissenters  as  "  honestly  "  as  he  hated  Whigs,  infidels,  French,  and 
Scotchmen. 

Though  called  the  Great  Moralist,  he  expounded  nothing  that 
could  be  called  an  ethical  system.  He  simply  applied  strong  good 
sense  to  the  common  situations  of  life.  His  first  principles  were 
understood,  not  stated. 

The  merits  of  his  literary  criticisms  were  the  result  of  his  good 
sense,  their  defects  the  result  of  his  narrow  sympathies  and  frag- 
mentary knowledge.  He  seldom  or  never  erred  on  the  side  of  ex- 
travagant praise.  He  admired  the  wonderful  powers  of  Shakspeare, 
defended  the  violation  of  the  "  unities,"  and  the  mixture  of  comedy 
with  tragedy ;  but,  along  with  the  great  dramatist's  virtues  he  enu- 
merated considerable  failings — occasional  "  tumour,  meanness,  tedi- 
ousness,  and  obscurity,"  wearisome  narration,  and  the  introduction 
of  frigid  conceits  and  quibbles,  to  the  ruin  of  true  sublimity  and 
pathos.  His  tendency  was  to  banish  from  poetry  everything  that 
would  not  be  approved  of  by  sober  reason.  In  some  points  his 
principles  of  criticism  were  better  than  his  practice.  He  laid  down 
that  "  in  order  to  make  a  true  estimate  of  the  abilities  and  merits 
of  a  writer,  it  is  always  necessary  to  examine  the  genius  of  his  age 
and  the  opinions  of  his  contemporaries."  But  this  was  a  perfec- 
tion-height of  critical  qualification  that  indolence  would  not  suffer 
himself  to  attain.  He  wrote  his  notes  on  Shakspeare  without 

2D 


418  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

having  read  a  single  one  of  the  contemporary  dramatists.  He 
had  plenty  of  time,  but  he  preferred  to  indulge  his  appetite  for 
social  talk  and  desultory  reading.  Sometimes,  too,  he  laid  down 
principles  that  he  broke  habitually  in  his  own  composition.  He 
satirised  plays  "  where  declamation  roars  and  passion  sleeps  "  ;  yet 
his  own  '  Irene '  belongs  to  the  category.  He  condemned  the  prac- 
tice of  filling  out  the  sound  of  a  period  with  unnecessary  words. 
It  is  but  fair  to  say  that  in  later  life  he  recognised  his  own  faults. 
On  one  occasion,  when  some  person  read  bis  '  Irene '  aloud,  he  left 
the  room,  saying  he  did  not  think  it  had  been  so  bad ;  and  in  his 
'  Lives  of  the  Poets '  he  tried  hard  to  work  himself  out  of  the  son- 
orous grandiloquence  of  the  '  Rambler.' 

ELEMENTS   OP   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — Johnson's  memory  for  words,  and  consequent  com- 
mand of  language,  was  amazing.  In  this  respect  he  stands  in  the 
very  first  rank.  One  might  suppose,  from  what  is  usually  said 
concerning  the  great  preponderance  of  Latin  words  in  his  diction, 
that  he  failed  in  command  of  homelier  language ;  but  this  is  a 
mistake.  His  '  Rambler '  is  highly  Latinised ;  but  in  his  Preface 
to  Shakspeare,  1768,  we  trace  the  beginnings  of  a  homelier  style. 
In  his  'Lives  of  the  Poets'  the  style  is  not  so  Latinised  as  the 
average  style  of  the  present  day.  The  proportion  of  Latin  words 
is  not  above  half  as  great  as  in  a  leader  of  the  '  Times.'  He  is 
often  studiously  homely,  and  shows  a  perfect  command  of  homely 
diction.  Perhaps  the  less  pompous  diction  of  his  latest  produc- 
tions is  partly  a  result  of  his  great  practice  in  conversation.  As 
we  have  just  said,  he  was  conscious  of  the  blemish  in  his  '  Rambler,' 
and  endeavoured  to  amend. 

As  an  example  of  studied  variety  of  expression,  take  the  follow- 
ing comparison  between  punch  and  conversation : — 

"  The  spirit,  volatile  and  fiery,  is  the  proper  emblem  of  vivacity  and  wit ; 
the  acidity  of  the  lemon  will  very  aptly  figure  pungency  of  raillery  and 
acrimony  of  censure  :  sugar  is  the  natural  representative  of  luscious  adula- 
tion and  gentle  complaisance  ;  and  water  is  the  proper  hieroglyphic  of  easy 
prattle,  innocent  and  tasteless." 

Sentences  and  Paragraphs. — The  often-remarked  mannerism  of 
Johnson's  sentences  does  not  consist  in  one  particular,  but  in  the 
combination  of  several 

(i.)  The  frequent  use  of  the  balance  structure.  He  employs 
liberally  all  the  arts  of  balance  both  in  sound  and  in  sense.  In 
the  '  Lives  of  the  Poets  '  he  is  much  less  elaborate  and  sonorous  in 
his  balances  than  in  the  'Rambler.'  In  the  following  sentence 
from  the  '  Rambler '  there  are  five  different  balances  : — 

"It  is  easy  to  laugh  at  the  folly  of  him  who  refuses  immediate  ease  for 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  419 

distant  pleasure,  and  instead  of  enjoying  the  blessings  of  life,  lets  life  glide 
away  in  preparations  to  enjoy  them  ;  it  affords  snc-h  opportunities  of  trium- 
phant exultation,  to  exemplify  the  uncertainty  of  the  human  state,  to  rouse 
mortals  from  their  dream,  and  inform  them  of  the  silent  celerity  of  time, 
that  we  may  believe  authors  willing  rather  to  transmit  than  examine  so 
advantageous  a  principle,  and  more  inclined  to  pursue  a  track  so  smooth 
and  so  flowery,  than  attentively  to  consider  whether  it  leads  to  truth. 

In  the  'Lives  of  the  Poets'  there  are  few  sentences  of  such 
sonorous  amplituda  In  this  later  work  balances  are  numerous ; 
but,  on  the  whole,  it  may  be  said  that  there  the  cadence  is  more 
varied,  and  that  we  have  a  greater  proportion  of  curt,  short  sen- 
tences and  balances,  in  the  following  emphatic  form  : — 

"Observation  daily  shows  that  much  stress  is  not  to  be  laid  on  hyper- 
bolical accusations  and  pointed  sentences,  which  even  he  that  utters  them 
desires  to  be  applauded  rather  than  credited, " 

Such  balances  as  the  following  are  very  common — "  If  his  jests 
are  coarse,  his  arguments  are  strong;"  "too  judicious  to  commit 
faults,  but  not  sufficiently  vigorous  to  attain  excellence;"  "his 
figures  neither  divert  by  distortion,  nor  amaze  by  exaggeration ; " 
"however  exalted  by  genius,  or  enlarged  by  study." 

(2.)  Short  comprehensive  sentences.  These  appear  plentifully 
in  all  his  works,  but,  partly  from  the  nature  of  the  subject,  are 
especially  plentiful  in  the  'Lives  of  the  Poets.'  The  following 
short  passage  is  a  fair  illustration : — 

"  In  the  poetical  works  of  Swift,  there  is  not  much  upon  which  the  critic 
can  exercise  his  powers.  They  are  often  humorous,  almost  always  light,  and 
have  the  qualities  which  recommend  such  compositions,  easiness  and  gaiety. 
They  are,  for  the  most  part,  what  their  author  intended.  The  diction  is 
correct,  the  numbers  are  smooth,  and  the  rhymes  exact.  Tliere  seldom 
occurs  a  hard-laboured  expression,  or  a  redundant  epithet;  all  his  verses 
exemplify  his  own  definition  of  a  good  style  ;  they  consist  of '  proper  words 
in  proper  places. ' " 

(3.)  One  of  the  most  striking  mannerisms  in  Johnson's  com- 
position belongs  strictly  to  the  paragraph — to  the  arrangement  of 
sentences  rather  than  the  arrangement  of  clauses.  He  has  a  habit 
of  abruptly  introducing  a  general  principle  before  the  particular 
circumstances  that  it  applies  to.  We  have  remarked  this  as  a 
peculiarity  in  Macaulay's  style.  If  Johnson  did  not  originate  tin* 
form  of  composition,  he  was  at  least  the  first  to  bring  it  into 
prominence.  After  him  it  was  extensively  adopted.  Alacaulay 
is  hitherto  his  most  celebrated  imitator. 

The  following  passage  concerning  Cowley  is  an  example  of  his 
abrupt  introduction  of  general  principles.  It  exemplifies  also  a 
cognate  practice  of  abruptly  bringing  in  a  person  or  thing  con 
trasted  or  compared  with  the  subject  of  the  discourse : — 

"In  the  year  1647,  his  'Mistress'  was  published  ;  for  he  imagined,  as 
he  declared  in  a  preface  to  a  subsequent  edition,  Unit  '  poets  are  scarcely 


420  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

thoueht  freemen  of  their  company,  without  paying  some  duties,  or  obliging 
themselves  to  he  true  to  love.' 

"This  obligation  to  amorous  ditties  owes,  I  believe,  its  orginal  to  the 
fame  of  Petrarch,  who,  in  an  age  rude  and  uncultivated,  by  his  tuneful 
homage  to  his  Laura,  refined  the  manners  of  the  lettered  world,  and  filled 
Europe  with  love  and  poetry.  But  tlie  basis  of  all  excellence  is  truth:  Ju 
that  professes  love  ought  to  feel  its  power.  Petrarch  was  a  real  lover,  and 
Laura  doubtless  deserved  his  tenderness.  Of  Cowley  we  are  told  by  Barnes, 
who  had  means  enough  of  information,  that,  whatever  he  may  talk  of  his 
own  inflammability,  and  the  variety  of  characters  by  which  his  heart  was 
divided,  he  in  reality  was  in  love  but  ouce,  and  then  never  had  resolution  to 
tell  his  passion. 

"  This  consideration  cannot  but  abate  in  some  measure  the  reader's  esteem 
for  the  works  and  the  author.  To  love  excellence  is  natural ;  it  is  natural 
likewise  for  tfie  lover  to  solicit  reciprocal  regard  by  an  elaborate  display  of  his 
own  qualifications.  The  desire  of  pleasing  has  in  different  nten  produced 
actions  of  heroism,  and  effusions  of  wit ;  but  it  seems  as  reasonable  to  appear 
the  champion  as  the  poet  of  '  an  airy  nothing,'  and  to  quarrel  as  to  write  for 
what  Cowley  might  have  learned  from  his  master  Pindar  to  call  '  the  dream 
of  a  shadow.' " 

To  make  up  what  is  called  the  "Johnsonian  manner,"  or 
"Johnsonese,"  we  must  take  not  only  these  striking  peculiarities 
of  sentence-structure,  but  certain  other  peculiarities,  especially  a 
peculiar  use  of  the  abstract  noun,  and  vigorous  comprehensive 
brevity.  Macaulay's  sentence-structure  is  modelled  in  a  consider- 
able degree  upnn  Johnson's,  yet  the  resemblance  is  not  at  first  so 
striking,  because  Macaulay  is  a  concrete  and  diffuse  writer,  whereas 
Johnson  is  extremely  abstract  and  condensed. 

Figures  of  Speech, — Similitudes.  —  Our  author's  prose  is  not 
ornate.  He  studies  condensed  expression  rather  than  embellish- 
ment or  illustration.  None  of  our  great  prose  writers  is  so  spar- 
ing of  similitudes.  In  the  '  Rambler '  there  are  pages  that  contain 
hardly  a  single  metaphor. 

The  few  similitudes  that  he  does  use  are  in  harmony  with  the 
general  loftiness  of  his  style.  Thus,  Imlac  is  represented  as  saying 
to  Rasselas — 

"The  world,  which  you  figure  to  yourself  smooth  and  quiet  as  the  lake 
in  the  valley,  you  will  find  a  sea  foaming  with  tempests,  and  boiling  with 
whirlpools  ;  you  will  be  sometimes  overwhelmed  by  the  waves  of  violence, 
and  sometimes  dashed  agaiust  the  rocks  of  treachery." 

Again,  writing  of  the  subversion  of  the  Roman  Empire  lj>  the 
Northern  barbarians,  he  says  that  had  America  then  been  dis- 
covered, and  navigation  sufficiently  advanced,  "the  intumescence 
of  nations  would  have  found  its  vent,  like  all  other  expansive  vio- 
lences, where  there  was  least  resistance" 

Allegory. — There  are  several  allegories  in  the  'Rambler'  on  the 
model  of  the  allegories  in  the  '  Spectator.'  One  in  the  '  Rambler ' 
on  "  Wit  and  Learning  "  is  the  model  of  Dr  Campbell's  allegory 
cm  "  Probability  and  Plausibility,"  examined  minutely  in  the  Ap- 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  421 

pcndix  to  Bain's  '  Rhetoric.'  The  allegoric  style  of  composition, 
though  still  occasionally  used,  now  makes  its  appearance  in  com- 
position much  less  frequently  than  in  the  age  of  Johnson.  The 
following  is  an  example  of  the  artificial  manufacture,  from  '  Ram- 
bler '  96 — "  Truth,  Falsehood,  and  Fiction,  an  Allegory  "  : — 

"While  the  world  was  yet  in  its  infancy,  TRUTH  came  among  mortals 
from  above,  and  FALSEHOOD  from  below.  TRUTH  was  the  daughter  of 
JUPITER  and  WISDOM  ;  FALSEHOOD  was  the  progeny  of  FOLLY  impregnated 
by  the  wind.  .  .  . 

"It  sometimes  happened  that  the  antagonists  met  in  full  opposition.  In 
these  encounters,  FALSEHOOD  always  invested  her  head  with  clouds,  and 
commanded  FRAUD  to  place  ambushes  about  her.  In  her  left  hand  she 
born  the  shield  of  IMPUDENCE,  and  the  quiver  of  SOPHISTRY  rattled  on  her 
shoulder.  All  the  passions  attended  at  her  call;  VANITY  clapped  her  wings 
before,  and  OBSTINACY  supported  her  behind,"  &c. 

Contrast. — From  his  earliest  composition  to  his  last,  Johnson 
shows  a  liking  for  strong  antithesis.  It  is  frequently  combined 
with  balance,  and  has  been  already  to  some  extent  illustrated. 
He  is  particularly  fond  of  antithesis  in  his  succinct  expositions  of 
character  and  style.  Goldsmith  is  "a  man  who  had  the  art  of 
being  minute  without  tediousness,  and  general  without  confusion ; 
whose  language  was  copious  without  exuberance,  exact  without 
constraint,  and  easy  without  weakness."  Rowe  "seldom  moves 
either  pity  or  terror,  but  he  often  elevates  the  sentiments ;  he  sel- 
dom pierces  the  breast,  but  he  always  delights  the  ear,  and  often 
improves  the  understanding."  "The  'Thessalia'  of  Rowe  deserves 
more  notice  than  it  obtains,  and  as  it  is  more  read  will  be  more 
esteemed."  We  have  already  quoted  his  account  of  Addison. 

QUALITIES   OP   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — Perhaps  the  most  common  objection  to  Johnson'i 
Btyle  is  that  it  contains  too  many  heavy  words  of  Latin  origin. 
The  objection  is  just,  but  there  are  one  or  two  things  that  the 
objectors  commonly  overlook  One  is  that  his  earlier  style  is 
much  more  Latinised  than  his  later :  as  already  remarked,  his 
'  Lives  of  the  Poets '  contains  more  of  the  Saxon  element  than  the 
average  style  of  the  present  day.  Another  thing  is  that  his  Latin 
derivatives  are  not  of  his  own  coining :  he  told  Boswell  that  he 
had  not  taken  upon  him  to  add  more  than  four  or  five  words  to 
the  language;  and  being,  as  a  lexicographer,  brought  painfully 
face  to  face  with  gaps  in  our  language,  he  must  in  this  respect 
have  practised  no  little  self-denial.  Finally,  he  is  much  lesa 
Latinised  than  several  writers  of  note  both  before  and  after  him 
— than  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  for  instance,  or  Robertson,  or  Gibbon. 

The  '  Rambler '  certainly  is  a.  very  ponderous  composition.  Re- 
viewing it  himself  later  in  life,  he  shook  his  head,  and  exclaimed 


422  FUOM   1730  TO    1760. 

that  it  was  "too  wordy."  Take  as  an  example  the  following, 
which  is  not  an  extreme  case : — 

"In  cities,  and  yet  more  in  courts,  the  minute  discriminations  which 
distinguish  one  from  another  are  for  the  most  part  effaced,  the  peculiarities 
of  temper  and  opinion  are  gradually  worn  away  by  promiscuous  converse, 
a«  angular  bodies  and  uneven  surfaces  lose  their  points  and  asperities  by 
frequent  attrition  against  one  another,  and  approach  by  degrees  to  uniform 
rotundity." 

Compare  this  with  a  passage  from  Sterne,  where  you  have  the 
same  idea: — 

"The  genius  of  a  people,  where  nothing  but  the  monarchy  is  salique, 
having  ceded  this  department,  with  sundry  others,  totally  to  the  women, 
by  a  continual  higgling  with  customers  of  all  ranks  and  sizes  from  morning 
to  night,  like  so  many  rough  pebbles  shook  along  together  in  a  bag,  by  ami- 
cable collisions  they  have  worn  down  their  asperities  and  sharp  angles,  and 
not  only  become  round  and  smooth,  but  will  receive,  some  of  them,  a  polish 
like  a  brilliant." 

Again,  take  the  following,  which  is  rather  an  extreme  example, 
and  reads  almost  like  caricature  "  Johnsonese  "  : — 

."The  proverbial  oracles  of  our  parsimonious  ancestors  have  informed  us, 
that  the  fatal  waste  of  fortune  is  by  small  expenses,  by  the  profusion  of  sums 
too  little  singly  to  alarm  our  caution,  and  which  we  never  suffer  ourselves 
to  consider  together.  Of  the  same  kind  is  the  prodigality  of  life;  he  that 
hopes  to  look  back  hereafter  with  satisfaction  upon  past  years,  must  learn  to 
know  the  present  value  of  single  minutes,  and  endeavour  to  let  no  particle 
of  time  fall  useless  to  the  ground. " 

A  simple  writer  would  have  expressed  this  in  some  such  way  as 
the  following : — 

"  Take  care  of  the  pennies,"  says  the  thrifty  old  proverb,  "  and  the  pounds 
will  take  care  of  themselves."  In  like  manner  we  might  say,  Take  care  of 
the  minutes,  and  the  years  will  take  care  of  themselves. 

The  heaviness  of  Johnson's  style  does  not  arise  from  any  ab- 
struseness  in  the  subject-matter.  The  '  .Rambler '  took  up  mainly 
subjects  suitable  for  light  reading.  The  explanation  seems  to  be 
that  his  ear  was  enamoured  of  a  measured  ponderous  movement, 
of  a  lofty  departure  from  the  simple  pace  of  common  speech,  and 
that  he  was  not  versatile  enough  to  adopt  any  other,  even  when 
this  was  flagrantly  unsuitable  to  the  occasion.  Myrtilla,  a  young 
lady  of  sixteen,  is  made  to  state  her  case  as  follows : — 

'  "  Sir,  you  seem  in  all  your  papers  to  be  an  enemy  of  tyranny,  and  to  look 
with  impartiality  upon  the  world ;  I  shall  therefore  lay  my  case  before  you, 
and  hope  by  your  decisiou  to  be  set  free  from  unreasonable  restraints,  and 
enabled  to  justify  myself  against  the  accusations  which  spite  and  peevish- 
ness produce  against  me. 

"At  the  age  of  five  years  I  lost  my  mother,  and  my  father,  being  not 
qualified  to  superintend  the  education  of  a  girl,  committed  me  to  the  care  of 
his  si&ter,  who  instructed  me  witli  the  authority,  aud,  not  to  deny  her  what 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  423 

she  may  justly  claim,  with  the  affection  of  a  parent.  She  had  not  very 
elevated  sentiments  or  extensive  views,  but  her  principles  were  good,  and 
her  intentions  pure;  and  though  some  may  practise  more  virtues,  scarce  any 
commit  fewer  faults." 

In  the  above  extract  we  see  one  good  example  of  the  peculiar  use 
of  the  abstract  noun  that  has  already  been  spoken  of  as  peculiarly 
Johnsonian.  He  uses  the  abstract  noun  with  an  active  verb  us  if 
it  were  the  name  of  a  person — "  the  accusations  which  spite  and 
peevishness  produce  against  me."  Another  example  is  seen  in  the 
extract  immediately  preceding — "  sums  too  little  singly  to  alarm 
our  caution."  This  is  one  of  Johnson's  most  characteristic  peculi- 
arities, and  appears  no  less  in  his  later  than  in  his  earlier  works. 

Clearness. — Writing  with  an  intense  concentration  of  his  energies 
upon  the  work  in  hand,  he  is  generally  successful  in  seizing  upon 
the  most  apposite  words  to  express  his  meaning.  He  is  also  anx- 
ious to  be  understood,  and  guards  the  reader  from  misapprehension 
by  stating  what  he  does  not  mean.  (We  have  already  exemplified 
his  frequent  use  of  contrast  to  explain  qualities  of  style.)  But  he 
was  too  hurried  to  be  a  minutely  accurate  writer.  His  assertions 
are  too  unqualified.  He  had  little  of  the  scrupulous  precision  of 
De  Quincey :  the  utmost  we  can  say  is,  that  his  expressions  are 
accurate  in  the  main,  and  that  he  had  an  honest  dislike  to  vague 
language.  He  ridicules  the  vague  use  of  the  word  Nature,  a  suj>- 
jiosititious  entity  not  unfrequently  appealed  to  even  in  our  tima 
Rasselas  asks  a  philosopher  what  is  meant  by  "  living  according  to 
nature,"  and  receives  the  following  caricature  in  answer: — 

"  To  act  according  to  nature,  is  to  act  always  with  due  regard  to  the  tit- 
ness  arising  from  the  relations  and  qualities  of  causes  and  effects ;  to  concur 
with  the  great  and  unchangeable  scheme  of  universal  felicity  ;  to  co-operate 
with  the  general  disposition  and  tendency  of  the  present  system  of  things. " 

Strength. — Johnson's  style  is  seldom  or  never  impassioned.  He 
delivers  himself  with  severe  magisterial  dignity  and  vigorous 
authoritative  brevity. 

Robert  Hall,  in  his  early  days,  made  Johnson  a  model,  but  soon 
gave  him  up,  complaining  of  a  want  of  fervour  in  his  morality. 
Though  profoundly  convinced  of  the  doctrines  of  Religion,  he  sel- 
dom dilates  on  her  "august  solemnities,"  or  on  the  grandeur  of 
her  hopes  and  fears.  What  he  keeps  principally  in  view  is  the 
beneficial  effect  of  religious  belief  on  human  conduct,  laying  down 
the  law  in  sonorous  dogmas. 

In  the  presence  of  objects  that  raise  emotions  of  sublimity  in 
other  men,  he  was  on  the  watch  to  lay  hold  of  general  rules.  In- 
stead of  giving  way  to  the  aesthetic  influences  of  the  situation,  he 
pondered  on  the  causes  or  the  moral  value  of  them,  and  meditated 
dictatorial,  high-sounding,  general  propositions.  He  acknowledged 
himself  impressed  by  the  ruins  of  Icolmkill ;  but  instead  of  giving 


424  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

expression  to  the  sublime  thoughts  awakened  by  the  place,  he 
fabricated  the  following  sentence : — 

"  Whatever  withdraws  us  from  the  power  of  the  senses ;  whatever  makes 
the  past,  the  distant,  or  the  future  predominate  over  the  present,  advances 
us  in  the  dignity  of  thinking  beings." 1 

One  may  choose  examples  of  his  severity  and  comprehensive 
vigour  from  any  page  of  the  '  Rambler '  or  of  the  '  Lives  of  the 
Poets.' 

Pathos. — A  certain  softness  is  thrown  over  the  stern  moralising 
of  the  '  Rambler '  by  the  humane  designs  of  the  moralist  Good 
advice,  however  roughly  given,  if  it  is  honest  and  not  ill-natured, 
has  a  kindly  effect.  Farther,  there  is  a  pathetic  air  of  gloomy 
melancholy  about  his  sonorous  reflections  on  the  vanity  of  human 
wishes.  But  there  is  little  in  any  part  of  Johnson's  writings  to 
touch  the  warmer  affections. 

On  themes  of  sorrow,  as  on  themes  of  sublimity,  his  power  to 
move  is  paralysed  by  his  constant  tendency  to  reason  and  moralise. 
Instead  of  sympathising  with  distress,  lie  seems  to  ask  himself,  Is 
distress  in  these  circumstances  reasonable  ?  Rasselas  in  the  happy 
valley  reasons  acutely  on  the  causes  of  his  discontent : — 

"I  can  discover  within  me  no  power  of  perception  which  is  not  glutted 
•with  its  proper  pleasures,  yet  I  do  not  feel  myself  delighted.  Man  surely 
has  some  latent  sense  for  which  this  place  affords  no  gratification,  or  he  has 
some  desires  distinct  from  sense,  which  must  be  satisfied  before  he  can  be 
happy." 

But  though  he  is  said  to  "  bewail  his  miseries  with  eloquence," 
his  lamentations  are  not  very  touching : — 

"  As  he  passed  through  the  fields,  and  saw  the  animals  around  him,  'Ye,' 
said  he,  '  are  happy,  and  need  not  envy  me  that  walk  thus  among  yon, 
burdened  with  myself;  nor  do  I,  ye  gentle  beings,  envy  your  felicity;  for 
it  is  not  the  felicity  of  man.  I  have  many  distresses  from  which  ye  are  free ; 
I  fear  pain  when  I  do  not  feel  it ;  I  sometimes  shrink  at  evils  recollected, 
and  sometimes  start  at  evils  anticipated  :  surety  the  equity  of  Providence  has 
balanced  peculiar  sufferings  with  peculiar  enjoyments." 

So  when  the  Princess  Nekayah  loses  her  favourite  maid  Pekuah, 
and  "sinks  down  inconsolable  in  hopeless  dejection,"  she  is  repre- 
sented as  holding  her  own  in  an  argument  with  the  philosopher 
Imlac  as  to  whether  she  "  does  well "  to  be  sorrowful : — 

1  This  proposition  is  an  example  of  the  sounding  tautology  that  Johnson  was 
sometimes  betrayed  into  by  his  powerful  command  of  expression.  It  might  be 
analysed  and  translated  into — "Whatever  makes  us  think  more,  gives  increased 
occupation  to  our  thoughts."  Similarly,  his  famous  couplet — 

"  Let  observation  with  extensive  view 
Survey  mankind  from  China  to  Peru," 

Is  rendered — "  Let  observation,  with  extensive  observation,  observe  mankind 
extensively." 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  425 

"'Since  Pekuah  was  taken  from  me,'  said  the  princess,  'I  have  no 
pleasure  to  reject  or  to  retain.  She  that  has  no  one  to  love  or  trust,  has 
little  to  hope.  Sne  wants  the  radical  principle  of  happiness.  We  may,  per- 
haps, allow,  that  what  satisfaction  this  world  can  afford,  must  arise  from  the 
conjunction  of  wealth,  knowledge,  and  goodness.  Wealth  is  nothing  but  as 
it  is  bestowed,  and  knowledge  nothing  but  as  it  is  communicated  :  they 
must  therefore  be  imparted  to  others,  and  to  whom  could  I  now  delight  to 
impart  them  I  Goodness  affords  the  only  comfort  which  can  be  enjoyed 
without  a  partner,  and  goodness  may  be  practised  in  retirement.' " 

In  the  expression  of  impassioned  affection  he  is  as  "uncouth 
and  tumultuous"  as  Garrick  described  him  to  have  been  in  his 
conjugal  endearments.  See,  for  example,  the  passionate  lament  of 
the  devoted  Anningait  on  leaving  his  mistress  Ajut : — 

"  '0  life  ! '  says  he,  'frail  and  uncertain  !  where  shall  wretched  man  find 
thy  resemblance  but  in  ice  floating  on  the  ocean  ?  It  towers  on  high,  it  sparkles 
from  afar,  while  the  storms  drive  and  the  waters  beat  it,  the  sun  melts  it 
above,  and  the  rocks  shatter  it  below.  What  art  thou,  deceitful  pleasure  ! 
but  a  sudden  blaze  streaming  from  the  north,  which  plays  a  moment  on  the 
eye,  mocks  the  traveller  with  the  hopes  of  light,  and  then  vanishes  for  ever  ? 
What,  love,  art  thou,  but  a  whirlpool,  which  we  approach  without  know- 
ledge of  our  danger,  drawn  on  by  imperceptible  degrees,  till  we  have  lost  all 
power  of  resistance  and  escape  t  Till  I  fixed  my  eyes  on  the  graces  of  Ajut, 
while  I  had  not  yet  called  her  to  the  banquet,  I  was  careless  as  the  sleeping 
morse,  I  was  merry  as  the  singers  in  the  stars.  Why,  Ajut,  did  I  gaze  upon 
thy  graces  ?  why,  my  fair,  did  I  call  thee  to  the  banquet  ?  Yet,  be  faith- 
ful, my  love,  remember  Anningait,  and  meet  my  return  with  the  smiles  of 
virginity.  I  will  chase  the  deer,  I  will  subdue  the  whale,  resistless  as  the 
frost  of  darkness,  and  unwearied  as  the  summer  sun.  In  a  few  weeks  I  shall 
return  prosperous  and  wealthy ;  then  shall  the  roe-fish  and  the  porpoise 
feast  thy  kindred  ;  the  fox  and  hare  shall  cover  thy  couch  ;  the  tough  hide 
of  the  seal  shall  shelter  thee  from  cold  ;  and  the  fat  of  the  whale  illuminate 
thy  dwelling.'" 

The  Ludicrous. — The  '  Rambler '  is  much  more  serious  in  its  tone 
than  the  'Spectator.'  There  is  a  greater  proportion  of  gravely 
didactic  papers.  Not  that  the  'Rambler'  has  not  considerable 
variety  of  topics.  He  does  not  confine  himself  to  rebuking  and 
satirising  vices :  like  the  '  Spectator,'  he  aims  at  being  a  censor  of 
minor  immoralities.  Humorous  satire  of  the  follies  of  young  men 
and  young  women  of  fashion  alternates  with  grave  rebuke  to  scep- 
ticism, and  grave  advice  to  young  and  old  of  both  sexes  and  of 
different  occupations.  But  the  prevailing  tone  is  serious. 

His  sarcasm  is  very  different  from  the  "  gay  malevolence "  of 
Addison,  and  his  humour  very  different  from  the  good-natured 
sympathy  of  Steele.  When  his  indignation  is  roused,  his  vitu- 
peration is  round  and  unqualified.  When  he  is  in  a  pleasant  mood, 
his  humour  is  broad  and  arrogant.  The  most  pleasing  form  of  his 
humour  is  when  he  is  humorous  at  his  own  expense. 

The  review  of  '  A  Free  Enquiry  into  the  Nature  and  Origin 
of  Evil,  by  Soame  Jenyns,'  is  a  well-known  example  of  his  bully- 
ing ridicule : — 


426  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

"He  calls  It  a  Free  Enquiry,  and  indeed  his  freedom  is,  I  think,  greatei 
than  his  modesty.  Though  he  is  far  from  the  contemptible  arrogance,  of 
the  impious  licentiousness,  of  Bolingbroke,  yet  he  decides  too  easily  upon 
questions  out  of  the  reach  of  human  determination,  with  too  little  con- 
sideration of  mortal  weakness,  and  with  too  much  vivacity  for  the  necessary 
caution." 

"  I  am  told  that  this  pamphlet  is  not  the  effort  of  hunger :  what  can  it  be 
then  but  the  product  of  vanity  ?  and  yet  how  can  vanity  be  gratified  by 
plagiarism  or  transcription  ?  When  the  specnlatist  finds  himself  prompted 
to  another  performance,  let  him  consider  whether  he  is  about  to  disburthen 
his  mind  or  employ  his  fingers  ;  and  if  I  might  venture  to  offer  him  a  sub- 
ject, I  should  wish  that  he  would  solve  this  question,  Why  he  that  has 
nothing  to  write,  should  desire  to  be  a  writer  ?  " 

The  above  shows  the  Great  Moralist  in  his  most  unfavourable 
aspect.  He  appeared  thus  only  when  his  deep  prejudices  were 
crossed.  Many  of  the  '  Ramblers '  are  full  of  genuine  humour, 
broad  and  hearty,  and  of  happy  strokes  of  wit  The  following 
account  of  "  The  Busy  Life  of  a  Young  Lady,"  purporting  to  bo 
written  by  herself,  is  a  favourable  specimen.  It  forms  one  of  the 
latest  '  Ramblers,'  and  is  written  in  an  appropriately  simple  style, 
as  if  he  had  been  warned  of  the  incongruity  of  his  sounding  periods 
on  similar  occasions  before : — 

"Dear  Mr  Rambler, — I  have  been  four  days  confined  to  my  chamber  by  a 
cold,  which  has  already  kept  me  from  three  plays,  nine  sales,  five  shows, 
and  six  card-tables,  and  put  me  seventeen  visits  behind  ;  and  the  doctor  tells 
my  mamma,  that  if  I  fret  and  cry,  it  will  settle  in  my  head,  and  I  shall  not 
be  fit  to  be  seen  these  six  weeks.  But,  dear  Mr  Rambler,  how  can  I  help 
it  t  At  this  very  time  Melissa  is  dancing  with  the  prettiest  gentleman  : 
she  will  breakfast  with  him  to-morrow,  and  then  run  to  two  auctions,  and 
hear  compliments,  and  have  presents ;  then  she  will  be  dressed,  and  visit, 
and  get  a  ticket  to  the  piny ;  then  go  to  cards  and  win,  and  come  home  with 
two  flambeaux  before  her  chair.  Dear  Mr  Hambler,  who  can  bear  it  ? 

"  My  aunt  has  just  brought  me  a  bundle  of  your  papers  for  my  amuse- 
ment. She  says  you  ore  a  philosopher,  and  will  teach  me  to  moderate  my 
desires,  ami  look  upon  the  world  with  indiiference.  But,  dear  Sir,  I  do  not 
wish  nor  intend  to  moderate  my  desires,  nor  can  I  think  it  proper  to  look 
upon  the  world  with  indifference,  till  the  world  looks  with  indifference  on 
me.  I  have  been  forced,  however,  to  sit  this  morning  a  whole  quarter  of 
an  hour  with  your  paper  before  my  face  ;  but  just  as  my  aunt  came  in, 
riiyllida  had  brought  nie  a  letter  from  Mr  Trip,  which  I  put  within  the 
leaves;  and  read  about  absence  and  inconsolableness,  and  ardour,  and  irresis- 
tible passion,  and  eternal  constancy,  while  my  aunt  imagined  that  I  was 
puzzling  myself  with  your  philosophy,  and  often  cried  out,  when  she  saw 
me  look  confused,  '  If  there  is  any  word  which  you  do  not  understand,  child, 
I  will  explain  it. ' 

"  But  their  principal  intention  was  to  make  me  afraid  of  men  ;  in  which 
they  succeeded  so  well  for  a  time,  that  I  durst  not  look  in  their  faces,  or  be 
left  alone  with  them  in  a  parlour  ;  for  they  made  me  fancy  that  no  man  ever 
spoke  but  to  deceive,  or  looked  but  to  allure  ;  that  the  girl  who  suffered  him 
that  had  once  squeezed  her  hand,  to  approach  her  a  second  time,  was  on  the 
brink  of  ruin  ;  and  that  she  who  answered  a  billet  without  consulting  her 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  427 

relations,  gave  love  such  power  over  her,  that  she  would  certainly  become 
either  poor  or  infamous. 

"But  I  am  most  at  a  loss  to  guess  for  what  purpose  they  related  such 
tragic  stories  of  the  cruelty,  perfidy,  and  artifices  of  men,  who,  if  they  ever 
were  so  malicious  and  destructive,  have  certainly  now  reformed  their  manners. 
1  have  not,  since  my  entrance  into  the  world,  found  one  who  does  not  jiro- 
fess  himself  devoted  to  my  service,  and  ready  to  live  or  die  as  I  ahull 
command  him.  They  are  so  far  from  intending  to  hurt  me,  that  their 
only  contention  is  who  shall  be  allowed  most  closely  to  attend,  and  most 
frequently  to  treat  me ;  when  different  places  of  entertainment  or  schemes 
of  pleasure  are  mentioned,  1  can  see  the  eye  sparkle  and  the  cheek  glow 
of  him  whop*)  proposals  obtain  my  approbation  ;  he  then  leads  me  off  in 
triumph,  adores  my  condescension,  and  congratulates  himself  that  he  has 
lived  to  the  hour  of  felicity.  Are  these,  Mr  Rambler,  creatures  to  be  feared  ? 
Is  it  likely  that  any  injury  will  be  done  me  by  those  who  can  enjoy  life  only 
while  I  favour  them  with  my  presence  f " 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Description.  —  Johnson  rarely  attempts  to  describe  natural 
scenery,  and  where  he  does  try,  as  in  the  description  of  the 
"  Happy  Valley,"  in  '  Rasselas,'  the  clumsiness  and  poverty  of  the 
language  betray  his  want  of  familiarity  with  the  work.  His  in- 
terest, as  he  boasted,  centred  in  man. 

Narration, — He  never  attempted  national  history.  Indeed  he 
had  a  positive  dislike  to  the  subject,  and  rudely  put  down  any- 
body that  introduced  it  into  conversation.  As  a  biographer,  he 
had  great  reputation  in  his  own  day.  His  Life  of  Savage,  and  his 
Lives  of  the  great  naval  heroes,  Blake  and  Drake  (contributed  to 
the  '  Gentleman's  Magazine '),  were  so  much  admired  and  talked 
of,  that  the  king  specially  desired  him  to  write  the  lives  of  his 
literary  predecessors. 

The  excellence  of  his  Lives  consists  not  in  narrative  skill,  nor  in 
power  of  showing  in  varied  lights  the  prominent  features  of  char- 
acter, but  in  the  numerous  maxims,  moral  and  literary,  attached 
to  the  biographical  incidents.  The  narrative  is  really  secondary. 
Such  is  his  propensity  to  moralise,  that  the  events  in  his  biog- 
raphies seem  reduced  to  the  importance  of  so  many  texts. 

Exposition. — Johnson  had  not  the  qualifications  of  a  popular 
expositor.  His  diction  was  too  Latinised,  and  he  did  not  suffi- 
ciently relieve  the  dryness  of  general  statements  by  examples  and 
illustrations. 

The  only  art  of  exposition  that  he  excels  in  is  the  putting  of  a 
statement  obversely.  We  have  already  remarked  his  love  of  anti- 
thesis. In  the  review  of  Jenyns  (which  is  also  a  good  measure  of 
his  logical  power)  this  is  particularly  apparent 

The  short  political  tract  entitled  "  The  Patriot "  is  a  very  fav- 
ourable specimen  of  his  expository  style.  He  considers  with  much 


428  FROM  1730  TO   1760. 

vigour  the  various  distinguishing  marks  of  a  true  patriot,  what 
he  will  do,  and  what  he  will  not  do ;  and  then,  obveiyely,  "  what 
will  prove  a  man  to  be  not  a  patriot." 

In  expounding  various  delusive  signs  of  patriotism,  he  proceeds 
almost  entirely  by  repetition  in  pointed  forms,  direct  and  obverse. 
The  following  is  a  specimen : — 

"Some  claim  a  place  in  the  list  of  patriots  by  an  acrimonious  and  unre- 
mitting opposition  to  the  Court. 

"This  mark  is  by  no  means  infallible.  Patriotism  is  not  necessarily  in- 
cluded in  rebellion.  A  man  may  hate  his  king,  yet  not  love  his  country. 
He  that  has  been  refused  a  reasonable  or  unreasonable  request,  who  thinks 
his  merit  underrated,  and  sees  his  influence  declining,  begins  soon  to  talk  of 
natural  equality,  the  absurdity  of  many  made  for  one,  the  original  compact, 
the  foundation  of  authority,  and  the  majesty  of  the  people.  As  his  political 
melancholy  increases,  he  tells,  and  perhaps  dreams,  of  the  advances  of  the 
prerogative,  and  the  dangers  of  arbitrary  power ;  yet  Ms  design  in  all  hia 
declamation  is  not  to  benefit  his  country,  but  to  gratify  his  malice." 

Even  this,  which  is  in  his  later  style,  and  is  much  more  simple  and 
concrete  than  the  'Rambler,'  would  have  been  more  popularly 
effective  if  enlivened  by  examples.  Macaulay  would  certainly  have 
produced  cases  in  point,  if  any  were  to  be  had.  The  following 
extract  is  more  lively  towards  the  end : — 

"  It  is  the  quality  of  patriotism  to  be  jealous  and  watchful,  to  observe  all 
secret  machinations,  and  to  see  public  dangers  at  a  distance.  The  true  lover 
of  his  country  is  ready  to  communicate  his  fears,  and  to  sound  the  alarm 
whenever  he  pereeives  the  approach  of  mischief.  But  he  sounds  no  alarm 
when  there  is  no  enemy  ;  he  never  terrifies  his  countrymen  till  he  is  terri- 
fied himself.  The  patriotism,  therefore,  may  be  justly  doubted  of  him, 
who"  [better,  we  may  justly  doubt  the  patriotism  of  him  that]  "professes 
to  be  disturbed  by  incredulities  ;  who  tells  that  the  last  peace  was  obtained 
by  bribing  the  Princess  of  Wales  ;  that  the  King  is  grasping  at  arbitrary 
power ;  and  that,  because  the  French  in  their  new  conquests  enjoy  their 
own  laws,  thois  is  a  design  at  Court  of  abolishing  in  England  the  trial  by 
juries." 

Persuasion. — Johnson's  faulty  exposition  diminished  hia  influ- 
ence with  the  generality  of  readers.  The  magisterial  air  of  his 
'Rambler'  probably  awed  many  into  reading  him.  with  respect, 
and  trying  to  profit  by  his  doctrine ;  but  the  dry  abstract  char- 
acter of  the  exposition  must  have  made  the  perusal  anything  but 
a  labour  of  love. 

His  political  tracts  must  have  exercised  the  very  minimum  of 
influence  for  the  productions  of  so  great  a  writer.  He  was  the  last 
man  in  the  world  to  conciliate  opposition,  and  his  strong  powers 
of  argument  were  warped  by  prejudice.  His  'Taxation  no  Tyr- 
anny,' written  to  defend  the  taxation  of  the  American  colonists 
against  their  will,  is  at  once  overbearing  and  sophistical  It 
might  inflame  and  iinbitter  partisans,  but  it  was  too  abusive  and 
too  unreasonable  to  make  converts. 


THEOLOGY.  429 


OTHER 

THEOLOGY. 

At  the  beginning  of  this  period  the  controversy  with  the  Deista 
was  at  its  height.  Tindal's  '  Christianity  as  old  as  the  Creation  ' 
had  wrought  the  excitement  to  a  frenzy.  There  was  no  lack  of 
replies  in  various  degrees  of  power  ;  Leland  enumerates  as  "  valu- 
able treatises"  that  appeared  within  the  year  1730,  works  by  Dr 
Thomas  Burnet,  Dr  Waterland,  Mr  Law,  Mr  Jackson,  Dr  Stebbing, 
Mr  Balguy,  James  —  afterwards  Dr  —  Foster,  and  a  "  pastoral  letter  " 
by  Bishop  Sherlock.  There  were  many  others.  One  of  the  most 
elaborate  defences  was  made  by  Dr  John  Conybeare  (1691-1757), 
afterwards  Bishop  of  Bristol  This  is  praised  by  Warburton  as 
"one  of  the  best-  reasoned  books  in  the  world." 

The  Deists  were  reinforced  by  Thomas  Morgan  find  Thomas 
Chubb.  Morgan  published  in  1737  'The  Moral  Philosopher,  a 
dialogue  between  Philalethes,  a  Christian  Deist,  and  Theophanes, 
a  Christian  Jew.'  He  does  not  hold  with  Tindal  that  the  Chris- 
tian republication  of  the  law  of  nature  is  superfluous.  He  holds 
that  Christ's  promulgation  of  "  the  true  and  genuine  principles  of 
nature  and  reason  "  "  were  such  as  the  people  had  never  heard  or 
thought  of  before,  and  never  would  have  known,  without  such  an 
instructor,  such  means  and  opportunities  of  knowledge."  He  calls 
himself  a  Christian  Deist  But  he  repudiates  both  miracles  and 
prophecy  :  Christ,  he  holds,  attained  moral  truth  by  "  the  strength 
and  superiority  of  his  own  natural  faculties,"  and  in  that  sense 
may  be  said  to  have  had  the  light  of  revelation  !  He  attacks 
Judaism.  "  He  representeth  the  law  of  Moses  as  '  having  neither 
truth  nor  goodness  in  it,  and  as  a  wretched  scheme  of  superstition, 
blindness,  and  slavery,  contrary  to  all  reason  and  common-sense, 
set  up  under  the  specious  popular  pretence  of  a  divine  instruction 
and  revelation  from  God.'  And  he  endeavours  to  prove  that  thia 
was  the  sentiment  of  St  Paul"  Further,  he  attacks  the  preaching 
of  the  apostles  —  "pretends  that  they  preached  different  gospels, 
and  that  the  New  Testament  is  a  jumble  of  inconsistent  religions." 
Morgan  was  specially  refuted  by  Joseph  Hallet,  Dr  John  Chap- 
man, and  Dr  Leland.  Thomas  Chubb  (1679-1747),  was  a  self- 
educated  man,  journeyman  to  a  tallow-chandler,  yet  much  taken 
notice  of  for  his  "strong  natural  parts  and  acuteness"  by  wealthy 
patrons  of  letters.  In  his  'True  Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ  asserted,' 
and  in  his  '  Discourse  on  Miracles,"  he  takes  much  the  same  ground 
as  Morgan.  He  left  for  publication  after  his  death  a  variety  of 
tracts  on  the  most  important  subjects  of  religion.  In  these  tracts, 
among  other  sceptical  views,  he  expresses  uncertainty  regarding  a 
future  life. 


430  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

Among  the  Deists  it  is  usual  to  reckon  Lord  Bolingbroke.  His 
philosophical  works,  containing  his  arguments  against  orthodox 
theology,  were  not  published  till  1754.  By  that  time  the  excite- 
ment had  died  down.  His  declamations  against  religion,  which 
went  far  beyond  all  previous  attacks,  were  replied  to  by  Leland 
and  Warburton. 

By  far  the  ablest  of  the  Christian  Apologists  was  Joseph  But- 
ler (1692-1752),  Bishop  of  Bristol  and  Dean  of  St  Paul's.  His 
'Analogy'  (1736)  is  so  compact  and  exhaustive,  that  it  has  super- 
seded and  destroyed  the  reputation  of  all  the  replies  to  the  Deists 
then  current  It  was  directed  chiefly  against  Tindal's  'Chris- 
tianity as  old  as  the  Creation.'  In  the  first  part  he  proves  elabor- 
ately that  there  is  a  Mural  Governor  of  the  universe  who  has 
placed  man  in  a  state  of  probation,  and  rebuts  any  argument  from 
the  incomprehensibility  of  parts  of  the  scheme  of  the  world  to 
the  untruth  of  the  leading  doctrines  of  natural  theology.  In  the 
second  part  he  maintains  Christianity  to  be  a  divine  republication 
of  natural  religion,  and  marshals  the  various  evidences.  The  work 
is  most  thorough.  It  is  a  sagacious  digest  of  all  that  had  been 
said  in  the  course  of  the  controversy.  "It  is  no  paradox  to  say 
that  the  merit  of  the  '  Analogy '  lies  in  its  want  of  originality.  It 
came  (1736)  towards  the  end  of  the  deistical  period.  It  is  the 
result  of  twenty  years'  study — the  very  twenty  years  during  which 
the  deistical  notions  formed  the  atmosphere  which  educated  people 
breathed.  The  objections  it  meets  are  not  new  and  unseasoned 
objections,  but  such  as  had  worn  well,  and  had  borne  the  rub  of 
controversy,  because  they  were  genuine.  And  it  will  be  equally 
hard  to  find  in  the  '  Analogy '  any  topic  in  reply  which  had  not 
been  suggested  in  the  pamphlets  and  sermons  of  the  preceding 
half-century."  "Butler's  eminence  over  his  contemporary  apolo- 
gists is  seen  in  nothing  more  than  in  that  superior  sagacity  which 
rejects  the  use  of  any  plea  that  is  not  entitled  to  consideration 
singly.  In  the  other  evidential  books  of  the  time,  we  find  a  mis- 
cellaneous crowd  of  suggestions  of  very  various  value;  never 
fanciful  but  often  trivial ;  undeniable,  but  weak  as  proof  of  the 
point  they  are  brought  to  prove."  1  The  matter  of  the  work  must 
indeed  be  of  sterling  value  to  retain  it  in  the  place  it  has  perma- 
nently assumed  as  a  text-book  of  Natural  Theology.  The  style,  as 
a  style  designed  for  general  reading,  could  hardly  be  worse.  It 
would  hardly  be  possible  to  make  a  book  more  abstruse  and  diffi- 
cult This  probably  arises  partly,  as  Mr  Pattison  points  out,  from 
his  aiming  at  logical  precision,  at  arranging  the  arguments  so  that 
each  shall  have  its  exact  weight,  and  no  more.  He  is  probably 
entitled  to  the  merit  of  precision.  But  his  sins  against  simplicity, 
against  ready  intelligibility,  are  heinous.  His  sentences  are  long 
1  Mr  Pattisou— Essays  and  Reviews,  pp  287,  289. 


THEOLOGY.  431 

and  intricate,  he  studies  to  express  himself  in  the  most  abstract 
form  possible,  and  there  are  very  few  examples  or  illustrations  to 
relieve  the  dry  press  of  general  statements.  His  defects  as  a 
popular  expositor  are  most  vividly  felt  when  he  is  compared 
•with  Paley,  who  may  be  said  to  have  interpreted  him  to  the 
multitude. 

In  William  Warburton  (1698-1779),  Bishop  of  Gloucester,  we 
see  a  controversialist  very  different  from  the  abstract  and  dignified 
Butler,  a  bold  man,  of  great  intellectual  force  and  wide  erudition. 
In  his  youth  he  was  articled  to  an  attorney.  He  took  orders  in 
1727,  and  soon  after  obtained  the  rectory  of  Brand  Broughton,  in 
Lincoln.  His  first  work  was,  in  1736,  on  the  alliance  between 
Church  and  State.  His  masterpiece  is  '  The  Divine  Legation  of 
Moses'  (1738).  The  leading  idea,  which  immediately  involved 
him  in  controversy,  is  the  paradox  that  there  is  no  mention  of  a 
future  state  in  the  Old  Testament,  and  that  this,  so  far  from  being 
an  argument  against  its  divine  origin,  is  an  argument  in  favour. 
With  much  learning  and  ingemiity  he  seeks  to  establish  that  no 
ruler  except  Moses  has  ever  kept  a  people  in  subjection  without 
the  sanction  of  punishments  in  a  future  life,  and  argues  that  Moses 
could  not  have  done  so  without  supernatural  assistance.  Besides 
this  great  work,  he  published  sermons  and  controversial  tracts 
chiefly  in  defence  of  the  Legation,  and  in  refutation  and  abuse 
of  Bolingbroke.  One  of  his  most  famous  exploits  was  his  defence 
of  Pope  against  the  charge  of  Deism.  Pope,  it  is  said,  had  been 
led  on  the  ice  by  his  friend  Bolingbroke,  and  had  adopted  doubt- 
ful tenets  without  being  fully  aware  of  their  bearing.  Warburton 
went  opportunely  to  the  rescue,  and  proved  a  redoubtable  cham- 
pion. In  Warburton  force  predominated  very  much  over  judg- 
ment He  delighted  in  upholding  paradoxes  and  hopeless  causes 
— arguing  with  great  ingenuity,  eking  out  his  argument  with 
plentiful  abuse,  and,  when  violently  excited,  even  going  the 
length  of  threatening  his  opponent  with  the  cudgel.  His  com- 
mand of  language,  if  used  with  greater  discretion,  would  have 
given  him  one  of  the  highest  places  in  literature.  His  style  is 
simple,  emphatic,  and  racy ;  diversified  with  clever  quotations 
and  pungent  sarcasm  (often  taking  the  form  of  irony). 

Dr  John  Leland  (1691-1766),  a  Presbyterian  minister  in  Dublin, 
acquired  considerable  fame  in  the  deistical  controversy,  which  he 
made  the  chief  occupation  of  his  Ufa  He  wrote  separate  works 
against  Tindal,  Morgan,  Dodwell,  and  Bolinghroke.  His  '  View 
of  the  Deistical  Writers'  (1754),  a  brief  work  written  in  a  spirit 
of  praiseworthy  moderation,  is  still  a  text-book  for  students  of 
divinity.  His  great  work,  '  On  the  Advantage  and  Necessity  of  a 
Christian  Revelation  '  (1764),  is  long  since  forgotten. 

Dr  Nathaniel  Lardner  (1684-1768),  also  a  Dissenting  minister, 


432  FROM    1730  TO    1760. 

published  between  1730  and  1757  his  voluminous  'Credibility  of 
the  Gospel  History.'  This  vast  quarry  of  learning  supplied  Paley 
with  the  material  for  his  more  neat  and  substantial  '  Evidences.' 

Dr  James  Foster1  (1697-1753),  another  Dissenting  minister 
— who,  when  he  preached  in  London,  drew  wits  and  beaux  to 
hear  him,  making  something  like  the  sensation  afterwards  pro- 
duced by  Edward  Irving — took  part  against  the  Deists  in  various 
tracts. 

While  the  deistical  controversy  was  raging,  sacred  literature 
was  not  wholly  neglected.  Bishop  Robert  Lowth  (1710-1787) 
acquired  great  fame  as  a  Biblical  critic,  translator,  and  commen- 
tator. Dr  Kennicot  (1718-1783)  began  in  1753  his  great  work  of 
collating  the  MSS.  of  the  Hebrew  Bible.  Bishop  Thomas  New- 
ton (1704-1782),  the  editor  of  Milton,  published  in  1754  his  famous 
'Dissertations  on  the  Prophecies.'  Archbishop  Seeker  (d.  1768), 
a  man  of  somewhat  eventful  life,  wrote  lectures  on  the  Catechism 
of  the  Church  of  England,  which  were  widely  circulated  in  their 
day.  Bishop  Edmund  Law  (1703-1787),  who  edited  the  works  of 
Locke,  and  whose  life  is  written  by  Paley,  published  '  Considera- 
tions on  the  Theory  of  Religion,  and  Reflections  on  the  Life  and 
Character  of  Christ.' 

Three  or  four  devotional  writings  (or  works  in  "  hortatory  the- 
ology," as  Dr  Johnson  calls  them)  that  were  written  during  this 
period  still  hold  their  ground.  Law's  '  Serious  Call  to  a  Holy 
Life '  (William  Law,  1686-1761)  is  remarkable,  aa  the  book  that 
is  said  to  have  converted  Johnson  from  youthful  levity.  Watts' s 
'  On  Improvement  of  the  Mind '  (Dr  Isaac  Watts,  1674-1748,  a 
youthful  prodigy,  a  well-known  author  of  religious  hymns)  was 
published  about  the  beginning  of  this  period.  Doddridge's  '  Rise 
and  Progress  of  Religion  in  the  Soul'  (Dr  Philip  Doddridge, 
1702-1751,  one  of  the  most  distinguished  of  Nonconformist  divines, 
and  author  of  numerous  religious  works)  was  published  in  1745. 
Hervey's  '  Meditations  on  the  Tombs '  (James  Hervey,  1714- 
1758,  took  part  against  Bolingbroke,  and  had  with  Sandemau 
a  controversy  of  his  own  concerning  the  nature  of  faith),  upon 
its  publication  in  1746,. achieved  immediate  popularity,  and  is 
still  to  be  found  in  nearly  every  Scotch  household — its  somewhat 
bombastic  ornaments  being  no  blemish  in  the  eyes  of  uncritical 
readers. 

The  most  celebrated  pulpit  orators  of  this  generation,  with  the 
exception  perhaps  of  James  Foster,  belonged  to  the  Methodists. 
The  germ  of  the  Methodist  Society  was  the  "  Holy  Club "  at 
Oxford,  which,  in  1732,  included  the  two  Wesleys,  John  and 
Charles,  Whitefield,  and  "  Meditation "  Hervey,  and  drew  inspi- 
ration from  the  author  of  the  '  Serious  Call,'  the  spiritual  father 
"•  All  these  three  D.D.'s  received  the  honour  from  Aberdeen. 


PHILOSOPHY.  435 

of  John  Wesley.     The  name  Methodist  was  first  given  to  Charles 
Wesley,1  and  from  him  extended  to  his  companions. 

John  Wesley  (1703-1791),  the  son  of  an  English  clergymans 
studied  at  Oxford  and  took  orders.  After  officiating  for  some 
years  as  curate  to  his  father,  he  returned  to  Oxford,  was  intro- 
duced by  his  brother  Charles  to  the  young  "Methodists,"  and 
entered  into  their  enthusiasm.  He  spent  two  years  in  evangel 
ising  the  newly  established  colony  of  Georgia  (1735-37).  Return 
ing  to  England,  he  found  himself  one  of  the  leaders  of  an  impetu- 
ous religious  awakening.  In  1741  he  and  Whiten" eld  agreed  to 
separate.  Wesley  was  comparatively  a  cold  man,  with  a  genius 
for  ruling,  and  strove  rather  to  restrain  the  impetuosity  of  his  fol- 
lowers, acting  as  a  drag  upon  their  estrangement  from  the  Church 
of  England.  He  did  not  permit  the  independent  organisation  of 
Methodism  till  1784.  His  preaching  had  not  the  melting  power 
of  Whitefield's.  It  would  seem  to  have  been  more  strenuous ;  at 
least  it  had  the  peculiar  effect  of  throwing  excitable  hearers  into 
convulsions. 

George  Whitefield  (1714-1770),  the  founder  of  Calvinistic  Meth- 
odism, was  celebrated  for  the  marvellous  power  of  his  oratory. 
He  preached  in  many  parts  of  England,  America,  and  Scotland. 
Everybody  is  familiar  with  the  anecdotes  of  his  preaching ;  with 
his  drawing  tears  from  the  eyes  of  the  Bristol  colliers,  and  money 
from  the  pocket  of  Benjamin  Franklin.  His  published  sermons 
are  far  from  equal  to  his  reputation ;  the  charm  seems  to  have 
been  in  his  voice,  elocution,  and  gesture. 

The  founders  of  the  Secession  Church  in  Scotland,  the  two 
brothers,  Ebenezer  and  Ralph  Erskine,  were  also  noted  preachers, 
especially  Ebenezer.  They  were  deposed  by  the  General  Assembly 
in  1740.  The  chief  cause  of  the  quarrel  with  the  Established 
Church  was  the  law  of  patronage.  They  are  usually  spoken  of  as 
heading  in  Scotland  a  religious  revival  such  as  Wesley  and  White- 
field  began  in  England. 

PHILOSOPHY. 

The  present  is  quite  a  flowering  period  in  ethical  and  meta- 
physical literature.  Hutcheson  was  in  full  vigour  at  the  com- 
mencement of  it ;  Edwards,  Hartley,  and  Hume  were  publishing 
before  it  was  far  gone ;  Price  and  Adam  Smith  began  to  publish 
just  before  its  close. 

Francis  Hutcheson  (1694-1747),  a  native  of  Ireland,  a  student 
at  Glasgow,  received  in  1729  the  appointment  of  Professor  of 

1  Charles  Wesley  was  six  years  older  than  Hervey  and  Whitefield,  and  was 
the  originator  of  the  Club.  When  he  introduced  his  brother  John  to  the  Club, 
John,  being  a  senior  of  about  thirty  years  of  age,  was  looked  up  to  with  respect, 
aud  soou  became  their  leader. 

2  iv 


434  FHOM   1730  TO    1760. 

Moral  Philosophy  in  Glasgow.  He  usually  receives  the  credit  ot 
having  by  his  eloquence  and  enthusiasm  given  the  first  great 
stimulus  to  mental  philosophy  in  Scotland.  His  chief  works  were 
— '  Inquiry  into  the  Original  of  our  Ideas  of  Beauty  and  Virtue,' 
first  published  in  1725  ;  'Essay  on  the  Nature  and  Conduct  of  the 
Passions  and  Affections,'  1728;  'A  System  of  Moral  Philosophy,' 
published  in  1755,  after  his  death,  containing  the  completest  ex- 
position of  his  views.  He  adopted  and  worked  out  Shaftesbury's 
suggestion  of  a  Moral  Sense.  He  maintained  the  existence  of  dis- 
interested feelings.  He  placed  the  Highest  Good  in  the  pleasures 
of  sympathy,  moral  goodness,  and  piety — exalting  these  against 
"creature  comforts,"  Epicurean  "enjoyment  of  life."  His  style 
was  copious  and  glowing.  He  tries  to  engage  the  attention  of  the 
reader  by  great  abundance  of  examples  and  comparisons. 

David  Hartley  (1705-1757),  a  physician,  was  the  first  to  bring 
into  prominence  the  doctrine  of  the  association  of  ideas,  explaining 
by  this  theory  the  growth  of  moral  sentiments.  He  is  still  more 
famous  as  the  first  English  writer  to  bring  into  prominence  the 
doctrine  that  the  brain  and  the  nerves  are  the  instruments  of  the 
mind.  Not  much  has  been  added  to  his  proofs.  He  held  that 
the  impressions  of  sense  are  conveyed  along  the  nerves  by  a  vibra- 
tory movement  His  '  Observations  on  Man '  was  published  in 
1749.  The  style  of  this  work  is  sober,  and  possesses  few  attrac- 
tions. It  is,  however,  sufficiently  clear,  and  the  doctrines  nob 
being  abstruse,  it  is,  for  a  psychological  work,  comparatively  easy 
reading. 

Jonathan  Edwards  (1703-1758)  is  notable  in  Philosophy  for  his 
arguments  against  the  so-called  Freedom  cvf  the  Will,  and  in  The- 
ology for  his  defence  of  the  doctrine  of  Original  Sin.  He  was  born 
in  Windsor,  Connecticut,  became  a  preacher,  was  closely  connected 
with  the  great  religious  revival,  though  himself  too  feeUe  and 
awkward  to  address  multitudes,  conducted  a  mission  to  the  In- 
dians, and  died  President  of  New  Jersey  College.  His  'Inquiry 
into  the  Freedom  of  the  Will'  was  published  in  1754;  his  work 
on  Original  Sin  in  1 758.  He  was  of  a  severe  ascetic  turn.  He  was 
driven  from  his  first  charge  as  a  minister  in  consequence  of  his 
rigorous  purging  of  the  sacramental  tables.  His  controversial 
acuteness  and  subtlety  in  drawing  distinctions  entitle  his  works  to 
their  high  rank.  He  had  little  turn  for  style.  Dry  and  precise, 
without  either  felicity  or  ornament,  his  writings  are  calculated  to 
repel  all  but  hard  students  of  their  particular  subjects. 

David  Hume  (1711-1776)  is  in  this  generation  what  Berkeley, 
Locke,  and  Hobbes  were  in  theirs.  He  belonged  to  a  good  Scot- 
tish family.  His  strong  literary  turn  appeared  at  an  early  age. 
He  tried  to  learn  first  law  and  then  commerce,  but  found  both 
uncongenial.  He  spent  three  years  iu  France  at  Rueiiiis  and  at 


PHILOSOPHY.  435 

the  Jesuit  College  of  La  Fleche.  Immediately  thereafter,  in  1739, 
he  published  his  'Treatise  of  Human  Nature.'  In  1741-42  ap- 
peared his  'Essays  Moral  and  Political';  in  1748  his  'Inquirj 
concerning  Human  Understanding';  in  1751  his  'Inquiry  con- 
cerning the  Principles  of  Morals'  ;  from  1754  to  1762  the  various 
volumes  of  his  '  History  of  England.'  While  these  were  in  course 
of  preparation  he  did  not  make  his  living  by  literature  alone. 
During  one  year  he  had  charge  of  an  insane  young  nobleman  ;  for 
two  years  he  was  secretary  to  General  St  Glair,  accompanying  him 
on  an  expedition  to  the  coast  of  France  and  on  a  mission  to  Turin. 
Thereafter  he  had  important  appointments  in  the  service  of  the 
Government  From  1763  to  1766  he  was  Secretary  to  the  British 
Embassy  at  Paris,  and  on  his  return  home  became  Under-Secre- 
tary  of  State  for  the  Northern  Department.  The  last  six  years 
of  his  life  he  spent  in  the  pleasant  society  of  Edinburgh.  His 
'  Dialogues  on  Natural  Religion '  were  published  by  his  nephew  in 
1779,  three  years  after  his  death.  Hume  is  described  as  a  corpu- 
lent man,  "  of  happily- balanced  temper,"  "  of  simple,  unaffected 
nature,  and  kindly  disposition."  He  says  of  himself — "  I  was,  I 
say,  a  man  of  mild  disposition,  of  command  of  temper,  of  an  open, 
social,  and  cheerful  humour,  capable  of  attachment,  but  little 
susceptible  of  enmity,  and  of  great  moderation  in  all  my  passions." 
He  was  not  a  very  productive  writer.  He  did  not  so  much  teem 
with  ideas ;  he  rather  gave  himself  to  the  steady  elaboration  of  a 
few.  His  philosophical  writings,  whatever  may  be  their  scientific 
value,  have  the  merit  of  being  clear  and  consistent.  He  was  very 
painstaking  with  his  composition.  His  manuscripts  bear  evidence 
of  the  most  careful  revision  and  fastidious  choice  of  words  and 
phrases.  Especially  was  he  anxious  to  weed  his  diction  of  Scotti- 
cisms, inviting  criticism  and  correction  with  a  genuine  desire  to 
profit  thereby.  He  offends  chiefly  by  using  terms  peculiar  to 
Scotch  law.  The  great  beauty  of  his  style  is  its  perspicuity.  His 
choice  of  words  is  often  very  apt,  and  the  combinations  felicitous. 
The  heavy  character  of  his  subjects  is  enlivened  by  a  constant  dry 
sparkle  of  antithesis,  and  occasional  touches  of  quiet  sarcasm  and 
humour.  He  is  highly  eulogised  by  Dr  Nathan  Drake — "The 
Essays  of  Hume,  in  fact,  sometimes  present  the  reader  with  the 
grace  and  sweetness  of  Addison,  accompanied  with  a  higher  finish- 
ing and  more  accurate  tact  in  the  arrangement  and  structure  of 
periods ;  so  that  no  language  is  more  clear  and  lively,  more  neat 
and  chaste,  more  durably  and  delicately  pleasing  to  the  ear,  than 
what  may  be  produced  from  the  best  portions  of  those  elaborate 
but  very  sceptical  disquisitions." 

Adam  Smith  and  Price  published  ethical  works  towards  the 
close  of  this  period,  but  they  belong  properly  to  the  next  gen- 
eration. 


436  FEOM   1730  TO   17CO. 


HISTORY. 

The  most  famous  historical  work  of  this  period  is  Hume's  *  His- 
tory  of  England,'  from  the  earliest  times  down  to  the  Revolution. 
The  author's  original  idea  was  to  write  this  History  from  the 
Union  of  the  Crowns  to  the  accession  of  George  I.  He  never 
brought  it  further  down  than  the  Revolution ;  and  when  he  had 
brought  it  to  that  point  he  enlarged  his  scheme  in  the  other  direc- 
tion— went  back  to  the  invasion  of  Julius  Caesar,  and  carried  down 
the  narrative  to  the  Union.  The  work  was  highly  popular.  It  is 
sometimes  compared  with  the  '  History  of  England '  by  Macaulay, 
who  began  where  Hume  left  off,  and  who  is  said  to  have  been 
ambitious  of  proving  a  worthy  continuator  of  the  elder  historian. 
The  style,  though  more  abstract  and  much  less  spirited  than 
Macaulay's,  and  though  the  writer  aimed  at  being  "  concise  after 
the  manner  of  the  ancients,"  was  brilliant  and  sparkling  as  com- 
pared with  the  ordinary  historical  performances  of  that  or  of  prior 
date.  There  was  also  in  the  work  a  great  feature  of  novelty. 
Hume  was  the  first  to  mix  with  the  history  of  public  transactions 
accounts  of  the  condition  of  the  people,  and  of  the  state  of  arts 
and  sciences.  Although  these  supplementary  chapters  of  his  are 
very  imperfect,  and  though  he  had  neither  materials  for  the  task 
nor  a  just  conception  of  the  difficulty  of  it,  still  the  little  that  he 
gave  was  a  pleasing  innovation.  Like  Macaulay,  he  is  accused  of 
partiality  in  his  explanation  of  events,  but  in  the  opposite  direc- 
tion. He  is  accused  of  giving  a  favourable  representation  of  the 
despotic  conduct  of  the  Stuarts,  and  of  trying  to  throw  discredit 
on  the  popular  leaders. 

A  'Complete  History  of  England,'  also  from  the  invasion  of 
Julius  Caesar,  but  brought  down  to  a  later  period  than  Hume's — 
to  1748  (afterwards  to  1765),  was  published  by  Tobias  Smollett, 
the  novelist,  in  1758.  A  narrative  from  Smollett's  pen  could  not 
fail  to  be  attractive.  But  such  a  work  written  in  fourteen  months 
could  hardly  compete  in  manner,  and  still  less  in  matter,  with  the 
eight  years'  careful  labour  of  Hume.  The  style  is  fluent  and  loose, 
possessing  a  careless  vigour  where  the  subject  is  naturally  exciting, 
but  composed  too  hastily  to  rise  above  dulness  in  the  record  of  dry 
transactions.  As  regards  matter,  the  historian  can  make  no  pre- 
tension to  original  research.  He  executed  the  book  as  a  piece  of 
buck -work  for  a  London  bookseller,  availing  himself  freely  of 
previous  publications,  and  taking  no  pains  to  bring  new  facts  to 
light  He  was  in  too  great  a  hurry  even  to  compare  and  check 
authorities :  the  history  is  said  to  be  full  of  errors  and  inconsist- 
encies. The  concluding  part  of  the  work  is  sometimes  printed  aa 
a  continuation  of  Hume. 


HISTORY.  437 

Among  the  minor  historians  of  the  period  were  Thomas  Carte 
(b.  1686),  an  intense  Jacobite,  secretary  to  Bishop  Atterbury, 
author  of  a  'General  History  of  England'  (1747),  and  of  a  '  His- 
tory of  the  Life  of  James,  Duke  of  Ormond ' ;  Nathaniel  Hooke 
(d.  1763),  who  assisted  the  famous  Duchess  of  Maryborough  in  the 
vindication  of  her  life,  compiler  of  a  'History  of  Rome'  (1733- 
1771),  remarkable  as  taking  the  side  of  the  plebeians;  William 
Harris  (1720-1770),  author  of  memoirs  of  James  L,  Charles  L, 
Oliver  Cromwell,  and  Charles  IL  ;  and  the  compilers  of  a  '  Uni- 
versal History,'  published  about  1760 — namely,  three  Scotsmen 
(Archibald  Bower,  John  Campbell,  and  William  Guthrie),1 
George  Sale  (translator  of  the  Koran),  and  George  Psalmanazar, 
the  pretended  native  of  Formosa  With  these  we  may  reckon 
Lord  Hervey,  the  Sporus  of  Pope,  whose  '  Memoirs  of  the  Reign 
of  George  II. ,  from  his  Accession  to  the  Death  of  Queen  Caroline,' 
were  published  by  Mr  Croker  in  1848. 

The  writer  of  the  '  Life  of  Cicero,'  a  historical  biography,  Dr 
Conyers  Middleton  (1683-1750),  receives  high  praise  for  his  style 
from  Dr  Nathan  Drake,  when  that  work  is  said  to  be  "  the  earliest 
classical  production  which  we  possess  in  the  department  of  history." 
This,  however,  is  considerably  modified  in  what  follows  : — 

"Its  reputation,  however,  as  a  specimen  of  fine  writing,  is  on  the  decline. 
.  .  .  The  chief  defects  of  the  composition  of  the  '  Life  of  Cirero'  have 
arisen  from  the  labour  bestowed  upon  it.  The  sentences  are  too  often,  in 
their  construction,  pedantic  and  stiff,  owing  in  a  great  measure  to  the  per- 
petual adoption  of  circumlocutions,  in  order  to  avoid  customary  phrases  and 
modes  of  expression.  The  author  has  indeed,  upon  this  plan,  given  a  kind 
of  verbose  dignity  to  his  style  ;  but,  at  the  same  time,  frequently  sacrificed 
ease,  perspicuity,  and  spirit.  In  grammatical  construction,  he  is  for  the 
most  part  pure  and  correct ;  but  in  his  choice  of  words  he  has  exhibited 
frequent  marks  of  defective  taste.  He  is  occasionally  elegant  and  precise, 
but  more  commonly  appears  majestic,  yet  encumbered,  struggling  under  the 
very  mass  of  diction  which  he  has  laboured  to  accumulate.  He  has  con- 
tributed, however,  to  improve  English  composition  by  affording  examples  of 
unusual  correctness  in  the  construction  of  his  sentences,  and  of  that  round- 
ness, plenitude,  and  harmony  of  period  lor  which  his  favourite  Cicero  has 
been  so  universally  renowned." 

Middleton  was  a  Fellow  of  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  an  im- 
placable enemy  of  the  Master,  Richard  Bentley,  with  whom  he  had 
several  lawsuits,  and  whose  New  Testament  he  attacked  with  ex- 
treme bitterness.  He  wrote  several  works  of  some  note  in  their 
day.  He  is  severely  handled  by  De  Quincey,  who  calls  him  "  the 
most  malignant  of  a  malignant  crew,"  rejoices  that  his  gross  unac- 

1  Mentioned  by  Boswell  as  a  political  writer  of  such  power,  that  Government 
"  thought  it  worth  their  while  to  keep  him  quiet  by  a  pension."  He  was  one  of 
the  first  authors  by  profession,  unconnected  with  polities,  though  he  <lid  uot 
scruple  to  enlarge  his  income  by  taking  a  side,  lie  is  praised  as  thelirst  historian 
that  made  extensive  searches  among  original  documents.  ' 


438  FROM   1730  TO   1760. 

knowledged  plagiarisms  were  detected,  denounces  him  for  being  a 
free-thinker  all  the  time  that  he  drew  his  bread  from  the  Church, 
and  says  that  his  style  "  at  one  time  obtained  credit  through  the 
caprice  of  a  fashionable  critic." 

The  antiquaries  of  the  period  were, — William  Stukeley  (1687- 
1765),  author  of  an  Itinerary ;  Dr  Thomas  Birch  (1705-1765),  an 
industrious  and  faithful  Dryasdust,  associated  with  Sale  in  editing 
Bayle's  Dictionary,  writer  of  biographical  memoirs,  editor  of  Milton, 
of  Dr  Robert  Boyle,  of  Thurloe's  State  Papers,  &c.  <fcc. ;  Thomas 
Elackwell  (1701-1757),  Principal  of  Marischal  College,  Aberdeen, 
a  great  enthusiast,  who  gave  a  new  impulse  to  classical  studies  in 
the  North,  and  whose  '  Memoirs  of  the  Court  of  Augustus '  was 
ridiculed  by  Johnson  for  its  affectations  of  style. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

Benjamin  Franklin  (1706-1790),  the  famous  discoverer  of  the 
identity  of  lightning  with  the  electrical  spark,  wrote  several  mis- 
cellaneous papers,  scientific  and  political,  which  have  doubtless 
had  no  small  influence  in  forming  American  style.  His  chequered 
life  is  pretty  generally  known.  He  made  his  fortune  as  a  printer, 
solely  by  his  own  sagacity,  industry,  and  prudence,  and  bore  a 
distinguished  part  in  the  assertion  of  American  independence,  act- 
ing as  ambassador  to  Franca  His  writings  are  remarkable  for 
simplicity,  terseness,  and  forca  Both  the  language  and  the  illus- 
trations fit  the  meaning  with  emphatic  closeness.  He  affects  no 
graces  of  style :  a  hard-headed,  practical  man,  he  seeks  to  convey 
his  meaning  as  briefly  and  as  emphatically  as  possibla  Thus — 

"  Be  studious  in  your  profession,  and  you  will  be  learned.  Be  industri- 
ous and  frugal,  and  you  will  be  rich.  Be  sober  and  temperate,  and  you  will 
be  healthy.  Be  in  general  virtuous,  and  you  will  be  nappy ;  at  least  you  • 
will,  by  such  conduct,  stand  the  best  chance  for  such  consequences." 

"He  that  spits  against  the  wind,  spits  in  his  own  face." 

"  He  thit  for  giving  a  draught  of  water  to  a  thirsty  person  should  expect 
to  be  paid  with  a  good  plantation,  would  be  modest  in  his  demands  com- 
pared with  those  who  think  they  deserve  heaven  for  the  little  good  they  do 
on  earth." 

A  writer  of  a  very  different  stamp  is  William  Melmoth 
(1710-1799),  the  elegant  translator  of  Pliny  and  Cicero,  and  author 
of  '  Letters  of  Sir  Thomas  Fitzosborne  on  several  Subjects '  (1742). 
"The  style  of  Melmoth,"  says  Dr  Nathan  Drake,  "both  in  his 
original  and  translated  works,  is  easy,  perspicuous,  and  elegant 
He  is  more  correct  in  grammatical  construction,  more  select  in  his 
choice  of  words,  than  any  preceding  writer ;  but  he  is  sometimes 
languid  and  verbose.  His  taste,  which  was  very  refined  and  pure, 
has  seldom  permitted  him  to  adopt  ornament  not  congenial  to  the 


MISCELLANEOUS   WEITEES.  439 

subject  of  discussion,  and  his  diction  is  therefore  singularly  chaste 
and  free  from  inflation." 

James  Harris  (1709-1780),  a  man  of  fortune,  who  rose  to  be  a 
Lord  of  the  Treasury,  was  celebrated  as  a  writer  on  Art,  Grammar, 
and  Logic.  His  most  famous  work  is  entitled  '  Hermes,  or  a  Phil- 
osophical Inquiry  concerning  Language  and  Universal  Grammar.' 

Dr  John  Brown  (1715-1766),  a  friend  of  Warburton  and  Pope,  a 
critic  of  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury,  is  praised  by  Wordsworth  as  the 
first  to  appreciate  and  describe  the  scenery  of  the  English  Lakes. 


CHAPTER    VIIL 


FROM    1760   TO    17901, 


EDMUND      BURKE, 
1728—1797. 

UNTIL  the  publication  of  Mr  Macknight's  'Life  of  Burke,'  the 
biographies  of  this  eminent  orator,  writer,  and  statesman  were  full 
of  minute  errors.  Contradictory  statements  prevailed  concerning 
the  date  and  place  of  his  birth,  the  religion  of  his  parents,  his 
early  education,  his  employments  before  he  entered  Parliament, 
and  many  other  points  wherein  assurance  is  to  be  desired  regard- 
ing a  man  of  such  eminence. 

He  was  born  in  a  house  on  Arran  Quay,  Dublin,  most  probably 
on  January  12,  1728  or  1729.*  His  supposed  ancestors  were 
wealthy  citizens  of  Limerick,  who  adhered  to  the  Catholic  faith, 
and  lost  their  possessions  in  the  time  of  Cromwell  His  father 
was  a  solicitor  in  good  practice,  and  belonged  to  the  Protestant 
communion.  His  mother's  name  was  Nagle ;  she  was  a  Roman 
Catholic.  It  is  of  some  consequence  to  note  that  Burke's  earliest 
years  were  spent  under  the  care  of  his  Catholic  uncles,  who  farmed 
some  land  of  their  own  in  the  south  of  Ireland,  and  that  his  school- 
master (Abraham  Shackleton,  of  Ballitore,  in  Kildare)  was  a 
Quaker.  He  had  thus  the  best  possible  training  in  the  toleration 
of  different  creeds.  From  1743  to  1748  he  was  a  student  in 
Trinity  College,  Dublin.  He  was  too  desultory  to  excel  in  the 
studies  of  the  place ;  he  had  occasional  fits  of  application  to  mathe- 
matics and  logic ;  and  he  was  awarded  a  scholarship  in  classics : 
but  he  did  not  carry  off  the  highest  honours  in  any  one  department 

1  1728  according  to  the  register  of  Trinity  College ;  1729  according  to  the  tablet 
in  Beaconsneld  Church. 


EDMUND  BTJRKE.  441 

Not  that,  like  his  contemporary  the  gay  Goldsmith,  he  wasted  his 
time  in  frolic  and  dissipation ;  but  he  gave  himself  up  to  miscel- 
laneous reading,  especially  of  poetry,  to  verse-making,  and  to  day- 
dreaming. In  1747  he  entered  his  name  at  the  Middle  Temple, 
and  in  1750  went  to  London  to  keep  law  terms ;  but  in  this  new 
study  he  showed  equally  little  diligence,  and  for  some  years  is  to 
be  conceived  "  as  a  young  Templar,  in  delicate  health,  fond  of 
jaunting  about  England,  fond  of  literature,  and  anything  but  fond 
of  law."  i 

His  first  literary  productions  appeared  in  1756.  'A  Vindication 
of  Natural  Society,'  intended  as  a  parody  of  Bolingbroke's  reason- 
ings on  religion,  is  sometimes  praised  as  a  successful  piece  of 
mimicry ;  but  it  contains  more  of  the  real  Burke  than  of  the  sham 
Bolingbroke.  It  may  be  viewed  as  an  exercise  in  the  style  that 
the  author  ultimately  adopted  as  his  habitual  manner  of  composi- 
tion. The  '  Essay  on  the  Sublime  and  Beautiful '  has  much  less 
glow  and  sweep  of  style ;  the  writer's  flow  of  words  seems  to  be 
painfully  embarrassed  by  the  necessity  of  observing  order  and 
proportion  of  statement.  In  1757  he  married.  The  same  year 
he  wrote  '  An  Account  of  European  Settlements  in  America,'  and 
an  unfinished  '  Essay  towards  an  Abridgment  of  English  History.' 
Next  year  he  suggested  to  Dodsley  the  '  Annual  Register,'  a  yearly 
summary  of  notable  facts.  He  is  supposed  to  have  written  the 
whole  of  this  annual  for  1758  and  for  1759,  and  to  have  contrib- 
uted the  political  summary  for  a  good  many  years  after. 

In  1759  he  was  introduced  more  intimately  to  political  life.  In 
that  year  he  became  connected  with  "  Single-Speech  "  Hamilton  as 
private  secretary,  or,  as  he  was  nicknamed,  "jackal,"  his  previous 
studies  making  him  well  qualified  to  act  as  political  tutor.  He 
accompanied  Hamilton  to  Ireland  in  1761,  and  is  supposed  to  have 
been  the  original  prompter  of  the  efforts  then  instituted  by  Gov- 
ernment to  relax  the  inhuman  penal  laws  against  the  Roman 
Catholics.  In  1765,  his  connection  with  Hamilton  having  ended 
in  an  open  rupture,  he  was  fortunate  enough  to  obtain  the  higher 
appointment  of  private  secretary  to  the  Prime  Minister,  Lord 
Rockingham,  who  continued  his  friend  and  patron  to  the  last 

He  entered  Parliament  in  1766  as  member  for  Wendover.  Our 
space  will  not  allow  us  to  trace  his  career  minutely.  During  his 
first  session  he  supported  Rockingham's  conciliatory  policy  towards 
the  irritated  colonies  of  North  America  in  speeches  that  fairly 
rivalled  the  eloquence  of  the  veteran  Chatham.  Thereafter  he 
vigorously  defended  this  policy  both  in  Parliament  and  out  of  it, 
with  speech  and  with  pamphlet,  through  several  stormy  years  until 
the  final  rupture  and  Declaration  of  Independence.  '  Observations 

1  The  story  that  in  1751  he  applied  for  the  Professorship  of  Logic  in  Glasgow 
is  discredited  as  absurd,  and  its  origin  sufficiently  accounted  for. 


442  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

on  a  late  Publication,  intituled  The  Present  State  of  the  "Nation,' 
a  reply  to  a  jeremiad  supposed  to  be  written  by  Grenville,  appeared 
in  1769;  'Thoughts  on  Present  Discontents'  in  the  following 
year.  His  patronage  of  the  colonies  was  widely  acknowledged 
In  1771  he  was  appointed  agent  for  the  State  of  New  York,  with 
a  salary  of  £500  a  year  ;  and  in  1774  he  was  returned  to  Parlia- 
ment free  of  expense  by  the  peace-loving  merchants  of  Bristol 
His  famous  speech  "  on  conciliation  with  America "  was  made  in 
support  of  certain  resolutions  that  he  introduced  in  1775. 

In  1778  he  supported  Lord  Nugent's  proposals  for  freeing  the 
trade  of  Ireland  from  certain  restrictions.  The  credit  of  this 
action — which,  indeed,  "  the  impartial  historian "  would  have 
expected  from  any  Irishman  of  moderately  patriotic  feelings — 
is  not  a  little  diminished  by  his  factious  opposition  to  Pitt's 
endeavours  in  1785  to  procure  the  abolition  of  the  remaining 
restrictions. 

In  1780  he  brought  forward  his  great  scheme  of  economical 
reform.  The  ministers  of  the  Crown  had  at  their  disposal  a  large 
number  of  lucrative  sinecures,  nominal  posts  in  the  royal  house- 
hold, and  suchlike.  On  this  patronage — a  gigantic  system  of 
corruption,  used  by  the  Government  to  bribe  adherents — Burke 
proposed  to  make  considerable  curtailments.  Only  a  small  part 
of  his  scheme  was  carried. 

About  the  same  time  his  attention  was  powerfully  drawn  to 
Indian  misgovernment  by  his  kinsman  William  Burke.  In  1781 
he  sat  on  a  committee  of  inquiry.  In  1783  he  assisted  in  concoct- 
ing Fox's  India  Bill,  which  proposed  to  abolish  the  East  India 
Company  and  vest  the  government  in  seven  commissioners  ap- 
pointed for  life.  Shortly  afterwards  he  opposed  the  more  consti- 
tutional and  judicious  Bill  introduced  by  Pitt.  One  of  the  most 
memorable  events  of  his  life  was  the  conduct  of  the  impeachment 
of  Warren  Hastings  for  tyrannical  abuse  of  his  power  as  Governor 
of  India.  The  trial  lasted  from  1788  to  1794,  judgment  not  being 
pronounced  till  1796. 

Much  has  been  said  regarding  his  views  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion, and  his  consequent  separation  from  his  political  associates 
In  a  debate  on  the  Army  Estimates  in  1790,  Fox  took  occasion  to 
praise  the  French  Guards,  because,  during  the  late  commotions, 
they  had  sided,  not  with  the  Court,  but  with  the  people ;  they 
"hail  shown  t)>at  men,  by  becoming  soldiers,  did  not  cease  to  be 
citizens."  In  the  course  of  the  same  debate  Burke  deprecated  this 
praise,  called  them  "  not  citizens,  but  base  hireling  mutineers,  and 
mercenary  sordid  deserters,"  and  warmly  asserted  that  rather  than 
give  the  least  countenance  in  England  to  the  distemper  of  France, 
he  would  "  abandon  his  best  friends,  and  join  with  his  worst 
enemies."  Afterwards,  when  the  leading  members  of  his  party 


EDMUND  BURKE.  443 

avowed  a  decided  sympathy  with  the  Revolution,  he  openly  and 
violently  broke  with  them,  and  employed  his  eloquence  in  decrying 
that  event  with  such  effect  that  he  has  been  called  the  leader  of 
the  reactionary  movement  throughout  Europe.  His  most  famous 
writings  on  the  subject  are  '  Reflections  on  the  French  Revolution,' 
1790  ;  '  An  Appeal  from  the  New  to  the  Old  Whigs,'  1791 ;  and 
'  Letters  on  a  Regicide  Peace,'  1796. 

In  1794  he  retired  from  Parliament  Shortly  after,  he  sustained 
a  great  blow  in  the  death  of  his  only  son,  who  had  just  been  elected 
for  Malton  in  his  stead.  Towards  the  end  of  the  same  year  he 
received  a  pension  from  Government ;  and  the  apparent  inconsist- 
ency of  an  economical  reformer  accepting  such  a  boon  having  been 
attacked  by  the  Duke  of  Bedford  in  the  House  of  Lords,  he  re- 
plied in  his  famous  "Letter  to  a  Noble  Lord,"  February  1795. 
He  died  at  Beaconsfield  on  July  8,  1797. 

Burke's  appearance  is  described  by  Mr  Macknight  in  the  follow- 
ing terms :  "  Tall,  and  apparently  endowed  with  much  vigour  of 
body,  his  presence  was  noble  and  his  appearance  prepossessing.  In 
later  years,  the  first  peculiarity  which  caught  the  eye  as  Burke 
walked  forwards,  as  his  custom  was,  to  speak  in  the  middle  of 
the  House,  were  his  spectacles,  which,  from  shortness  of  sight, 
seemed  never  absent  from  his  face.  .  .  .  His  dress,  though 
not  slovenly,  was  by  no  means  such  as  would  have  suited  a  leader 
of  fashion.  He  had  the  air  of  a  man  who  was  full  of  thought  and 
care,  and  to  whom  his  outward  appearance  was  not  of  the  slightest 
consideration.  But  as  a  set-off  to  this  disadvantage,  there  was  in 
his  whole  deportment  a  sense  of  personal  dignity  and  habitual 
self-respect.  .  .  .  His  brow  was  massive.  .  .  .  They  who 
knew  how  amiable  Burke  was  in  his  private  life,  and  how  warm 
and  tender  was  the  heart  within,  might  expect  to  see  these  softer 
qualities  depicted  on  his  countenance.  But  they  would  have  been 
disappointed.  It  was  not  usual  at  any  time  to  see  his  face 
mantling  with  smiles ;  he  decidedly  looked  like  a  great  man,  but 
not  like  a  meek  or  gentle  one.  ...  All  his  troubles  were 
impressed  on  his  working  features,  and  gave  them  a  somewhat 
severe  expression,  which  deepened  as  he  advanced  in  years,  until 
they  became  to  some  observers  unpleasantly  hard.  The  marks 
about  the  jaw,  the  firmness  of  the  lines  about  the  mouth,  the  stern 
glance  of  the  eye,  and  the  furrows  on  the  expansive  forehead,  were 
all  the  sad  ravages  left  by  the  difficulties  and  sorrows  of  genius, 
aud  by  the  iron  which  had  entered  the  soul" 

"During  his  boyhood,  and  even  for  some  years  after  he  had 
reached  manhood,  his  health  was  very  delicate."  He  had  an 
athletic  frame,  but  a  tendency  to  consumption  threatened  him  in 
his  childhood,  and  again  when  first  he  went  to  reside  in  London. 


444  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

De  Quincey  justly  describes  Burke  as  "  the  supreme  writer  of 
his  century."  No  writer  of  that  century  is  to  be  compared  with 
him  as  regards  command  of  English  expression.  With  equal 
justice,  as  it  seems  to  us,  he  is  described  by  Carlyle  as  "  a  man 
vehement  rather  than  earnest ;  a  resplendent,  far-sighted  Rheto- 
rician, rather  than  a  deep,  sure  Thinker."  Others,  who  eagerly 
and  somewhat  perversely  question  this  judgment  of  Carlyle' s, 
maintain  him  to  have  been  "  a  man  of  the  highest  genius,  taking 
rank  with  Shakspeare  and  Bacon."  There  is  no  necessary  dis- 
crepancy between  these  views,  if  only  we  recognise  diversity  of 
gifts,  and  cease  to  advance  impossible  claims  for  our  favourite 
authors.  Burke  may  have  had  as  much  intellectual  force  as  either 
Shakspeare  or  Bacon,  although  it  displayed  itself  in  a  different  line. 
To  be  such  a  rhetorician  as  he  was  implies  no  common  powers — 
immense  resources  of  expression  and  illustration,  a  wide  and  ready 
command  of  facts,  and  fertile  and  far-sighted  ingenuity  in  arrang- 
ing facts  and  principles  for  the  purposes  of  persuasion.  To  be 
among  the  foremost  rhetoricians  demands,  probably,  as  great  in- 
tellectual power  of  its  kind  as  to  be  among  the  foremost  poets  or 
the  foremost  men  of  science.  Be  this  as  it  may,  one  cannot  read 
much  of  Burke's  writings  without  seeing  that  they  are  essentially 
rhetorical  His  '  Vindication  of  Natural  Society  '  is  obviously  an 
exercise  in  the  art  of  special  pleading.  Even  his  'Essay  on  the 
Sublime  and  Beautiful '  is  the  work  of  a  rhetorician  rather  than  a 
clear-sighted  analyst  It  is  not  a  profound  analysis  of  aesthetic 
emotions,  but  a  wide  assemblage  of  facts,  and  an  ingenious  plead- 
ing in  favour  of  some  very  fanciful  theories.  His  various  pamphlets 
and  speeches  are,  as  Mr  Arnold  says,  "  saturated  with  ideas  "  ;  but 
the  ideas  are  all  brought  out  with  polemical  objects.  Many  of 
them  appear  to  have  occurred  in  the  heat  of  pressing  his  point, 
and  sometimes  their  application  even  carries  an  air  of  sophistry. 
The  claim  of  high  political  sagacity,  so  often  advanced  in  his 
favour,  is  not  incompatible  with  this  splendid  ingenuity  in  ac- 
cumulating substantial  and  insubstantial  arguments  in  support  of 
his  views.  Yet  one  may  well  doubt  whether  Burke's  political 
sagacity  was  of  the  first  rank.  Certain  of  his  predictions  are 
sometimes  quoted  as  evidence  of  this  sagacity ;  but  not  to  men- 
tion that  many  of  his  predictions  were  oracular  failures,  the  very 
fact  of  making  confident  political  predictions  is  in  itself  an  evi- 
dence of  want  of  sagacity.  It  is,  of  course,  unprofitable  to  argue 
regarding  a  term  so  vague ;  yet  we  are  safe  to  say  that  the  highest 
honours  of  sagacity  cannot  be  awarded  to  a  man  confessedly  one- 
Bided.  He  was  too  vehement  and  passionate  to  be  always  master 
of  his  sagacity.  "When  "his  passions  were  asleep,"  says  an  able 
editor  of  his  works,  "  and  his  judgment  calm,  no  man  could  dis- 
play more  perspicacity ;  the  range  and  comprehensiveness  of  hia 


EDMUND    HURKE.  445 

intellect  peculiarly  fitted  him  for  grappling  with  tlie  most  difficult 
and  complicated  subjects.  But  his  inuiyiiuilion  ivas  capable  of  lead- 
ing him  into  the  wildest  extravagances."  We  can  understand  hia 
vehemence  against  the  French  Revolution :  for  a  quarter  of  a 
century  he  had  been  the  persistent  champion  of  constitutional 
conservatism,  and  a  persistent  enemy  to  the  realisation  of  political 
ideals ;  and  in  the  close  of  his  life  he  found  his  lessons  violently 
infringed,  and  his  favourite  pupils  applauding  the  infringement  as 
the  highest  achievement  of  political  wisdom.  Nothing  could  have 
been  more  exasperating  to  a  man  of  proud  sensibilities.  But  his 
views  of  the  French  Revolution  are  not  the  only  evidence  of  his 
strong  partiality  for  his  own  schemes.  His  opposition  to  Pitt's 
India  Bill,  and  to  Pitt's  Bill  for  relieving  the  commerce  of  Ireland, 
offers  perhaps  stronger  evidence  of  blind  attachment  to  precon- 
ceived opinions.  Doubtless  he  saw  many  aspects  of  a  question, 
but  he  insisted  upon  throwing  over  them  all  a  colour  favourable 
to  his  own  conclusions.  The  inability  to  look  with  the  eyes  of 
other  men  is  universally  admitted  to  have  marred  his  influence  in 
Parliament.  Mr  Macknight,  who  writes  the  Hie  of  Burke  with 
somewhat  of  a  biographer's  partiality,  allows  that  "  his  vehemence 
indeed  was  frequently  injurious  to  the  object  he  had  in  view. 
With. his  friends  in  a  hopeless  minority,  his  cherished  measures 
entirely  defeated,  and  his  policy  abhorred  both  by  the  Court  and  the 
nation,  instead  of  growing  apathetic,  or  at  least  quiescent,  during 
this  summer,  he  became  only  the  more  pertinacious,  and  even 
violent  in  his  denunciations  of  the  Indian  interest  and  the  Govern- 
ment which  it  supported.  His  speeches  at  this  time  abound  in 
imagery,  philanthropy,  wisdom,  all  the  noblest  characteristics  of 
his  genius ;  yet  was  the  manner  of  their  delivery  so  impetuous  and 
fervent,  that  plain  men,  who  knew  nothing  and  cared  less  about 
the  crimes  which  he  declared  to  have  been  perpetrated  in  India, 
thought  his  zeal,  remaining,  as  it  did,  unseconded  by  the  two 
leaders  of  the  House,  to  be  almost  incompatible  with  soundness 
of  mind." 

In  many  respects  Burke  presents  a  strong  contrast  to  the  social 
open-hearted  Goldsmith.  Both  were  compassionate  and  generous, 
and  both  were  extremely  sensitive  to  kindness  and  to  affronts. 
But  Burke  had  much  more  pride  and  reserve  about  him  than 
Goldsmith ;  he  was  a  much  more  dignified  character.  Goldsmith, 
with  his  keen  sense  of  the  ridiculous,  and  his  power  and  habit  of 
looking  at  himself  from  a  spectator's  point  of  view,  often  made  a 
butt  of  his  own  failings.  Burke  bore  himself  with  decorous  self- 
respect  When  Goldsmith  wanted  money,  he  borrowed  openly 
and  without  shame ;  Burke  died  lieavily  in  debt,  yet  somehow  we 
never  hear  the  circumstance  mentioned.  There  was  a  correspond- 
ing difference  between  the  men  in  their  social  demeanour.  Gold- 


446  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

smith  bestowed  his  affections,  one  might  almost  say,  promiscuously ; 
he  was  ready  to  fraternise  with  almost  anybody :  Burke,  on  the 
contrary,  was  a  man  of  intense  personal  attachments,  a  devoted 
husband,  a  fond  father,  a  firm  adherent  to  the  interests  of  his 
patron.  Volatile  in  his  likings,  Goldsmith  was  equally  volatile  in 
his  dislikings.  He  was  eminently  a  placable  man,  incapable  of  a 
sustained  grudge.  Burke  hated  with  a  vehemence  corresponding 
to  the  warmth  of  his  attachments,  and  thought  no  expression  too 
coarse,  no  comparison  too  degrading,  for  the  objects  of  his  resent- 
ment To  complete  the  parallel,  Goldsmith's  wit  is  light,  and  his 
style  very  seldom  endeavours  to  soar;  Burke  deals  rather  in 
dignified  irony  or  direct  personal  ridicule,  and  often  soars  to  the 
highest  heights  of  rhetorical  sublimity. 

Burke  possessed  great  industry,  great  powers  of  acquisition. 
"  He  used  to  boast  that  he  had  '  none  of  that  master-vice,  sloth,* 
in  his  disposition."  "The  most  minute  provisions  of  a  compre- 
hensive act  of  legislation  —  the  most  wearisome  drudgeries  of 
Parliamentary  committees — the  driest  and  most  tedious  investi- 
gations necessary  for  drawing  up  elaborate  reports, — to  all  this 
his  patience  and  industry  were  fully  equal.  Some  of  the  public 
documents  he  drew  up  are  generally  allowed  to  be  perfect  models 
of  that  species  of  composition." 

His  ideal  polity  was  government  by  a  patriotic  aristocracy.  He 
was  never  weary  of  maintaining  that  the  end  of  government  is  the 
good  of  the  people,  not  the  aggrandisement  of  the  governing  body. 
At  the  same  time,  he  did  not  recognise  what  the  majority  of  voices 
has  since  declared  to  be  the  best  means  of  securing  this.  He 
resisted  Parliamentary  reform.  Looking  to  the  corruption  and 
venality  of  the  electors,  he  was  disposed  rather  to  lessen  their 
number  with  a  view  to  increasing  their  weight  and  independence. 
Against  the  selfishness  of  rulers,  in  case  they  were  inclined  to 
pursue  their  own  interests  and  forget  their  duties  to  the  country, 
he  provided  no  check  but  unembodied  public  opinion. 

From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  his  political  life  he  frequently 
declaimed  against  the  immediate  practical  application  of  what  he 
called  "metaphysical  theories"  of  government  He  was  partic- 
ularly hostile  to  the  obtrusion  of  "  natural  rights  "  as  a  basis  for 
legislation.  The  statesman  has  to  consider  not  what  is  right  in 
the  abstract,  but  what  is  expedient  in  given  circumstances.  For 
his  own  part,  the  British  constitution  came  near  his  ideal  polity, 
and  he  vehemently  contended  that  no  change  should  be  made 
except  to  remedy  specific  grievances.  The  disabilities  of  the 
Catholics,  hardships  in  the  Penal  Code,  financial  extravagance, 
the  iniquities  of  the  Slave  Trade,  were  unmistakable  definite 
evils,  and  should  be  redressed ;  deficient  representation  in  Parlia- 


EDMUND  BUKKE.  447 

ment  was  but  an  imaginary  evil — a  hardship  in  speculation,  not 
ID  practice. 

With  all  his  contempt  for  "  visionary  politicians,"  "  metaphy- 
sical theorists,"  "  legislators  of  the  schools,"  "  sophisters,"  and 
suchlike,  he  must  not  be  classed  with  such  "practical  men"  as 
Macaulay,  who  profess  to  dispense  with  theory  altogether.  "  I 
do  not,"  he  says,  "  put  abstract  ideas  out  of  the  question,  because 
I  well  know  that  under  that  name  I  should  dismiss  principles, 
and  that  without  the  guide  and  light  of  sound,  well-understood 
principles,  all  reasonings  in  politics,  as  in  everything  else,  would 
be  only  a  confused  jumble  of  particular  facts  and  details,  without 
the  means  of  drawing  out  any  theoretical  or  practical  conclusion." 
Again — 

"  I  do  not  vilify  theory  and  spectilation — no,  because  that  would  be  to 
vilify  reason  itself.  No  ;  whenever  1  speak  against  theory,  I  always  mean 
a  weak,  erroneous,  fallacious,  unfounded,  or  imperfect  theory ;  and  one  of 
the  ways  of  discovering  that  it  is  a  false  theory  is  to  compare  it  with  practice. 
This  is  the  true  touchstone  of  all  theories  which  regard  man  and  the  affairs 
of  men." 

True,  his  language  is  not  always  so  guarded ;  and  unless  we 
happen  to  light  upon  the  right  passages,  we  shall  suppose  him  to 
have  embraced,  in  his  contempt  for  metaphysical  politics,  all  works 
on  the  theory  of  government,  from  Locke  downwards.  If  we  read 
attentively,  we  find  that  in  his  calm  moments  he  was  far  from 
despising  political  theories ;  his  real  aversion  was  for  attempts  to 
give  immediate  effect  to  political  ideals  in  all  their  completeness : — 

"  I  do  not  mean  to  condemn  such  speculative  enquiries  concerning  this 
great  object  of  the  national  attention"  (the  Constitution).  "They  may 
tend  to  clear  doubtful  points,  and  possibly  may  lead,  as  they  have  often 
done,  to  real  improvements.  What  I  object  to,  is  their  introduction  into  a 
discourse  relating  to  the  immediate  state  of  our  affairs,  and  recommending 
plans  of  practical  government. " 

One  great  feature  in  his  statesmanship  was  his  consistent  en- 
deavour to  introduce  into  the  conduct  of  affairs  between  nation 
and  nation  higher  principles  of  morality.  Nations  should  be 
humane,  just,  and  generous  in  their  dealings  with  nations,  as 
men  should  be  humane,  just,  and  generous  in  their  dealings  with 
men ;  what  is  immoral  for  a  man  is  equally  immoral  for  a  nation. 
He  ignored  the  fact  that  there  is  no  earthly  tribunal  to  preside 
over  international  disputes ;  no  executive  to  punish  international 
delinquencies ;  no  higher  power  to  guarantee  nations  in  the  posses- 
sion of  life  and  property  should  their  neighbours  be  less  generous 
and  just  than  themselves. 


448  FROM    1760   TO   1790. 


ELEMENTS    OF    STYLE, 

Vocabulary. — Burke' s  command  of  expression  is  strikingly  rich. 
He  rejoices  in  multiform  repetitions,  in  varied  presentations  of  the 
subject-matter : — 

"  It  may  be  safely  said  that  there  never  was  a  man  under  whose 
hands  language  was  more  plastic  and  ductile.  No  matter  what  his 
subject — no  matter  what  the  modification  of  thought  which  de- 
mands expression — he  has  always  at  command  language  at  once 
the  most  appropriate  and  the  most  beautiful.  As  to  the  materials 
of  his  style,  his  vocabulary  was  as  extensive  as  his  knowledge, — 
and  that  was  boundless.  It  consisted  of  the  accumulated  spoils  of 
many  languages  and  of  all  agea  Not  only  so,  the  technicalities 
and  appropriated  phraseology  of  almost  all  sciences  and  arts,  pro- 
fessions and  modes  of  life,  were  familiar  to  him,  and  were  ready  to 
express  in  the  most  emphatic  manner  the  exhaustless  metaphors 
which  his  imagination  supplied  from  these  sources.  What  is  not 
a  little  remarkable,  he  could  employ  with  equal  power  all  the  ele- 
ments of  our  copious  language,  combining  the  eloquence  and  rich- 
ness of  a  classical  diction  with  all  the  nerve  and  energy  of  our 
Saxon  vernacular.  For  lofty  or  dignified  sentiment,  he  has  at 
command  all  the  magnificence  of  the  former ;  while  to  give  point 
and  energy  to  sarcasm,  and  ridicule,  and  invective,  he  can  employ 
the  full  powers  of  the  latter." 

We  have  already  sai  1  that  we  regard  such  unqualified  panegyrics 
as  hopeless  but  profitable  ideals,  rather  than  descriptions  of  any- 
thing that  has  been  or  can  be  actually  achieved.  Perfect  command 
of  English,  like  any  other  perfection,  is  hard  to  attain ;  we  must 
be  content  to  rank  Burke  among  the  few  that  have  come  nearest 
to  that  perfection. 

The  following  are  two  examples  of  his  habit  of  urging  the  same 
fact  in  many  different  forms.  The  first  is  from  his  reply  to  the 
political  pamphlet  supposed  to  have  been  written  by  Grenville  : — 

"The  piece  is  called  'The  Present  State  of  the  Nation.'  It  may  be  con- 
•idered  as  a  sort  of  digest  of  the  avowed  maxims  of  a  certain  political  school, 
the  effects  of  whose  doctrines  and  practices  this  country  will  feel  long  and 
severely.  It  is  made  up  of  a  farrago  of  almost  every  topic  which  has  been 
agitated  on  national  a£fairs  in  Parliamentary  debate,  or  private  conversation, 
for  these  last  seven  years.  The  oldest  controversies  are  hauled  out  of  the 
dust  with  which  time  and  neglect  had  covered  them.  Arguments  ten  times 
repeated,  a  thousand  times  answered  before,  are  here  repeated  again.  Public 
accounts  formerly  printed  and  reprinted  revolve  once  more,  and  find  their 
old  station  in  this  sober  meridian.  All  the  commonplace  lamentations  upon 
the  decay  of  trade,  the  increase  of  taxes,  and  the  high  price  of  labour  and 
provisions,  are  here  retailed  again  and  again  in  the  same  tone  with  which 
they  have  drawled  through  columns  of  Gazetteers  and  Advertisers  for  • 
ccuiury  together.  Paradoxes  which  aU'ruiit  common  -sense,  and  uuiiiterest- 


EDMUND   BUUKE.  449 

ing  barren  truths  which  generate  no  conclusion,  are  thrown  in  to  augment 
unwieldy  bulk  without  adding  anything  to  weight.  Because  two  accusations 
are  better  than  one,  contradictions  are  set  staring  one  another  in  the  face 
without  even  an  attempt  to  reconcile  them.  And,  to  give  the  whcle  a  sort 
of  portentous  air  of  labour  and  information,  the  table  of  the  House  of  Com- 
mons is  swept  into  this  grand  reservoir  of  politics." 

Our  other  example  is  taken  from  the  famous  '  Letter  to  a  Noble 
Lord':— 

"Making  this  protestation,  I  refuse  all  revolutionary  tribunals,  where 
men  have  been  put  to  death  for  no  other  reason  than  that  they  had  obtained 
favours  from  the  Crown.  I  claim  not  the  letter,  but  the  spirit,  of  the  old 
English  law — that  is,  to  be  tried  by  my  peers.  I  decline  his  Grace's  juris- 
diction  as  a  judge.  I  challenge  the  Duke  of  Bedford  as  &  juror  to  pass  upon 
the  value  of  my  services.  Whatever  his  natural  parts  may  be,  I  cannot 
recognise  in  his  few  and  idle  years,  the  competence  to  judge  of  my  long  and 
laborious  life.  If  I  can  help  it,  he  shall  not  be  upon  the  inquest  of  my 
quantum  meruit.  Poor  rich  man  !  He  can  hardly  know  anything  of  public 
industry  in  its  exertions,  or  can  estimate  its  compensations  when  its  work 
is  done.  I  have  no  doubt  of  his  Grace's  readiness  in  all  the  calculations  of 
vulgar  arithmetic ;  but  I  shrewdly  suspect  that  he  is  little  studied  in  the 
theory  of  moral  proportions ;  and  has  never  learned  the  rule  of  three  in  the 
arithmetic  of  policy  and  state. " 

Sentences. — Giving  his  strength  to  the  choice  of  words  and  of 
illustrations,  he  seems  to  have  paid  little  attention  to  the  mech- 
anism of  his  sentences.  Clumsily  constructed  sentences  occur 
frequently  in  his  essay  on  the  'Sublime  and  Beautiful,'  and 
occasionally  in  his  later  productions.  He  cannot  be  said  to 
write  in  a  formed  style.  In  many  of  his  vehement  passages  the 
sentences  move  with  an  abruptness  and  rapidity  resembling  the 
habitual  mannerism  of  Macaulay.  Nearly  all  the  'Letter  to  a 
Noble  Lord'  is  written  in  this  style.  The  following  extract  is 
a  good  specimen : — 

'  In  one  thing  I  can  excuse  the  Duke  of  Bedford  for  his  attack  upon  me 
and  my  mortuary  pension.  He  cannot  readily  comprehend  the  transaction 
he  condemns.  What  I  have  obtained  was  the  fruit  of  no  bargain  ;  the 
production  of  no  intrigue ;  the  result  of  no  compromise ;  the  ett'ect  of  no 
solicitation.  The  first  suggestion  of  it  never  came  from  me,  mediately  or 
immediately,  to  His  Majesty  or  any  of  his  ministers.  It  was  long  known 
that  the  instant  my  engagements  would  permit  it,  and  before  the  heaviest 
of  all  calamities  had  for  ever  condemned  me  to  obscurity  and  sorrow,  I  had 
resolved  on  a  total  retreat.  I  had  executed  that  design.  I  was  entirely  out 
of  the  way  of  serving  or  of  hurting  any  statesman  or  any  party  when  the 
ministers  so  generously  and  so  nobly  carried  into  effect  the  spontaneous 
bounty  of  the  Crown.  Both  descriptions  have  acted  as  became  them. 
When  I  could  no  longer  serve  them,  the  ministers  have  considered  my 
situation.  When  I  could  no  longer  hurt  them,  the  Revolutionists  have 
trampled  on  my  infirmity,  My  gratitude,  I  trust,  is  equal  to  the  manner 
in  which  the  benefit  was  conferred.  It  came  to  me,  indeed,  at  a  time  of 
life,  and  in  a  state  of  mind  and  body,  in  which  no  circumstance  of  fortune 
could  afford  me  any  real  pleasure.  But  this  was  no  fawlt  in  the  royal  donor, 
or  in  his  ministers,  who  were  pleased,  in  acknowledging  the  merit*  of  an 

9,  V 


450  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

invalid  servant  of  the  public,  to  assuage  the  sorrows  of  a  desolate  old 
man. " 

Figures  of  Speech. — Burke's  profusion  of  figurative  language  has 
been  the  theme  of  endless  admiration.  His  mind  was  a  repertory 
of  things  generally  known  concerning  history,  sciences,  profes- 
sions, manufactures,  handicrafts ;  and  he  drew  illustrations  from 
all  classes  of  subjects  in  his  multifarious  knowledge.  It  is  too 
much  to  say  that  "  abstract  and  physical  science,  the  most  familiar 
and  domestic  arts,  the  professions,  nay,  the  handicrafts  practised 
by  all  classes  of  men,  must  yield  up  their  peculiar  mysteries,  tlieir 
most  recondite  and  technical  phraseology,  to  furnish  the  materials 
of  his  illustrations."  Such  things  need  "  illustration  "  rather  than 
afford  it  To  make  obscurities  plain,  we  do  not  have  recourse  to 
the  most  recondite  and  technical  phraseology  of  special  occupa- 
tions. Burke  does,  indeed,  occasionally  use  very  technical  terms 
— such  as  "  lixiviated  "  and  "  aphelion  "  ;  but  it  is  misleading  to 
speak  of  this  in  the  language  of  admiration. 

It  is  usually  said  that  his  later  writings  are  much  more  figura- 
tive than  his  earlier.  In  the  hands  of  Macaulay  this  paradoxical 
circumstance  has  been  greatly  exaggerated.  The  figurative  lan- 
guage of  his  earlier  productions  is  more  subdued,  and  attracts 
comparatively  little  attention ;  but  the  figurative  turn  is  unmis- 
takably there.  And  the  language  of  his  youthful  letters  is  quite 
as  extravagant  as  the  most  extravagant  of  his  fulminations  against 
the  French  Revolution. 

Like  Carlyle,  he  makes  abundant  use  both  of  tropes  and  of  the 
explicit  figures.  He  is  especially  rich  in  metaphors :  he  has  been 
called  "  the  greatest  master  of  metaphor  that  the  world  has  ever 
seen;"  and  if  we  except  Carlyle,  we  may  allow  that  he  is  the 
most  metaphorical  of  our  prose  writers. 

We  shall  not  attempt  to  give  a  classified  illustration  of  his 
figures.  They  are  taken,  as  we  have  said,  from  many  sources. 
A  few  extracts  from  his  'Letter  to  a  Noble  Lord'  will  give  the 
reader  a  fair  idea  of  their  character.  We  must,  however,  remem- 
ber that  this  composition  was  written  at  fever -heat,  with  the 
flaming  vehemence  of  insulted  sensibility,  and  that  the  illustra- 
tions have  a  corresponding  temperature.  Otherwise  the  specimen 
is  sufficiently  representative : — 

"  Let  me  tell  my  youthful  censor  that  the  necessities  of  that  time  required 
something  very  different  from  what  others  then  suggested,  or  what  his  Grace 
now  conceives.  Let  me  inform  him  that  it  was  one  of  the  most  critical 
periods  in  our  annals. 

"Astronomers  have  supposed,  that  if  a  certain  comet,  whose  path  inter- 
cepted the  ecliptic,  had  met  the  earth  in  some  ( I  forget  what)  sign,  it  would 
have  whirled  us  along  with  it,  in  its  eccentric  course,  into  God  knows  what 
regions  of  heat  and  cold.  Had  the  portentous  cornet  of  the  Rights  of  Man 
(which  'from  its  horrid  hair  shakes  pestilence  and  war,'  and  '  with  fear  of 


EDMUND   BURKE.  451 

change  perplexes  monarehs"),  had  that  comet  crossed  upon  us  in  that  inter- 
nal state  of  England,  nothing  human  could  have  prevented  our  being  irre- 
sistibly hurried  out  of  the  highway  of  heaven  into  all  the  vices,  crimes, 
horrors,  and  miseries  of  the  French  Revolution. 

"  Happily,  France  was  not  then  jacobinised.  Her  hostility  was  at  a  good 
distance.  We  had  a  limb  cut  off  ;  but  we  preserved  the  body.  We  lost  our 
colonies  ;  but  we  kept  our  constitution.  There  was  indeed  much  intestine 
heat ;  there  was  a  dreadful  fermentation.  Wild  and  savage  insurrection 
quitted  the  woods,  and  prowled  about  our  streets  in  the  name  of  reform. 

"  Had  [certain  '  Parliamentary  reforms ']  taken  place,  not  France,  but 
England,  would  have  had  the  honour  of  leading  up  the  death  -dance  of 
democratic  revolution. 

"  My  measures  were,  what  I  then  truly  stated  them  to  the  Housa  to  be,  in 
their  intent,  healing  and  mediatorial.  I  heaved  the  lead  every  inch  of  way 
I  made. 

"The  French  revolutionists  complained  of  everything;  they  refused  to 
reform  anything ;  and  they  left  nothing,  no,  nothing  at  all  unchanged. 
The  consequences  are  before  us — not  in  remote  history,  not  in  future  prog- 
nostication :  they  are  about  us  ;  they  are  upon  us.  The  revolution  harpies 
of  France,  sprung  from  night  and  hell,  or  from  that  chaotic  anarchy  which 
generates  equivocally  '  all  monstrous,  all  prodigious  things,'  cuckoo-like, 
adulterously  lay  their  eggs,  and  brood  over  and  hatch  them  in  the  nest  of 
every  neighbouring  State.  These  obscene  harpies,  who  deck  themselves  in 
I  know  not  what  divine  attributes,  but  who  in  reality  are  foul  and  ravenous 
birds  of  prey  (both  mothers  and  daughters),  flutter  over  our  heads,  and 
souse  down  upon  our  tables,  and  leave  nothing  unrent,  unrifled,  unravaged, 
or  unpolluted  with  the  slime  of  their  filthy  ofl'al. 

"  I  was  not,  like  his  Grace  of  Bedford,  swaddled,  and  rocked,  and  dandled 
into  a  legislator  ;  Nitor  in  adversum  is  the  motto  for  a  man  like  me.  At 
every  step  of  my  progress  in  life  (for  every  step  was  1  traversed  and  op- 
posed), and  at  every  turnpike  I  met,  I  was  obliged  to  show  my  passport, 
and  again  and  again  to  prove  my  title  to  the  honour  of  being  useful  to  my 
country. 

"  The  grants  to  the  house  of  Kussel  were  so  enormous  as  not  only  to  out- 
rage economy,  but  even  to  stagger  credibility.  The  Dnke  of  Bedford  is  the 
leviathan  among  all  the  creatures  of  the  Crown.  He  tumbles  about  his 
unwieldy  bulk  ;  he  plays  and  he  frolics  in  the  ocean  of  the  royal  bounty. 
Hugs  as  he  is,  and  whilst  '  he  lies  floating  many  a  rood,'  he  is  still  a  crea- 
ture. His  ribs,  his  fins,  his  whalebone,  his  blubber,  the  very  spiracles 
through  which  he  spouts  a  torrent  of  brine  against  his  origin,  and  covers  me 
all  over  with  the  spray  —  everything  of  him  and  about  him  is  from  the 
throne.  Is  it  for  him  to  question  the  dispensation  of  the  royal  favour  I 

"  The  persons  who  have  suffered  from  the  cannibal  philosophy  of  Frame 
are  so  like  the  Duke  of  Bedford,  that  nothing  but  his  Grace's  probably  not 
speaking  quite  so  good  French,  could  enable  us  to  find  out  any  difference. 
.  .  .  I  assure  him  that  the  Frenchified  faction,  more  encouraged  than 
others,  are  warned  by  what  has  happened  in  France.  Look  at  him  and  his 
landed  possessions  as  an  object  at  once  of  curiosity  and  rapacity.  He  ia 
inmle  fur  them  in  every  part  of  their  double  character.  As  robbers,  to  them 


452  FKOM   1760  TO   1790. 

he  is  a  noble  booty ;  as  speculatists,  he  is  a  glorious  subject  for  their  experi- 
mental philosophy.  He  affords  matter  for  an  extensive  analysis  in  all  the 

branches  of  their  science,  geometrical,  physical,  civil,  and  political 

Deep  philosophers  are  no  fritters  :  brave  sans-culottes  are  no  formalists. 
They  will  no  more  regard  a  Marquis  of  Tavistock  than  an  Abbot  of  Tavi- 
stock  ;  the  Lord  of  Woburn  will  not  be  more  respectable  in  their  eyes  than 
the  Prior  of  Woburn  ;  they  will  make  no  difference  between  the  superior  of 
a  Covent  Garden  of  nuns,  and  of  a  Covent  Garden  of  another  description. 
They  will  not  care  a  rush  whether  his  coat  is  long  or  short ;  whether  the 
colour  be  purple  or  bine  and  buff.  They  will  not  trouble  their  heads  with 
what  part  of  his  head  his  hair  is  cut  from  ;  and  they  will  look  with  equal 
respect  on  a  tonsure  and  a  crop.  Their  only  question  will  be,  that  of  their 
Lfffrndre,  or  some  other  of  their  legislative  butchers,  how  he  cuts  up  ?  how 
he  tallows  in  the  caul  or  on  the  kidneys? 

"  Is  it  not  a  singular  phenomenon,  that  whilst  the  sans-culotte  carcase- 
butchers,  and  the  philosophers  of  the  shambles,  are  pricking  their  dotted 
lines  upon  his  hide,  and  like  the  print  of  the  poor  ox  that  we  see  at  the 
shop-windows  at  Charing-Cross,  alive  as  he  is,  and  thinking  no  harm  in  the 
world,  he  is  divided  iuto  rumps,  and  sirloins,  and  briskets,  and  into  all  sorts 
of  pieces  for  roasting,  boiling,  and  stewing,  that  all  the  while  they  are 
measuring  him,  his  Grace  is  measuring  me  ;  is  invidiously  comparing  the 
bounty  of  the  Crown  with  the  deserts  of  the  defender  of  his  order,  and  in 
the  same  moment  fawning  on  those  who  have  the  knife  half  out  of  the 
sheath — poor  innocent ! 

•Pleas'd  to  the  last,  he  crops  the  flow'ry  food, 
And  licks  the  hand  just  raised  to  shed  his  blood."* 

QUALITIES   OP  STYLE. 

Simplicity. — From  the  nature  of  his  subjects,  and  the  imperious 
necessity  of  being  directly  intelligible  to  an  audience,  the  public 
speaker  generally  uses  a  more  familiar  diction  than  the  writer  of 
recondite  books  ;  and  when  he  takes  his  pen  in  hand  to  produce  a 
political  pamphlet,  his  style  is  likely  to  have  something  of  the  easy 
intelligibility  of  his  speeches.  Burke  cannot  be  classed  among  the 
more  abstruse  writers  of  our  language.  But  he  may  be  said  to  be 
abstruse  for  an  orator.  His  turn  of  expression  is  often  abstract ; 
and  in  the  pursuit  of  loftiness  and  dignity,  he  introduces  a  large 
mixture  of  unfamiliar  words  from  Latin  sources. 

Not,  however,  that  he  is  invariably  magniloquent.  He  fre- 
quently unl>ends,  and  then  becomes  homely  enough.  Especially 
when  he  wishes  to  cover  anything  with  ridicule,  his  words  are 
taken  from  everyday  speech,  and  his  figures  from  the  commonest 
objects;  indeed,  both  words  and  figures  are  often  plain  to  the 
degree  of  being  coarse. 

He  is  the  model  of  Macaulay  in  his  abundant  use  of  facts  and 
statistics.  But  his  facts  and  statistics  have  not  the  simple  effect 
of  Macaulay's ;  he  is  more  thoroughgoing,  enters  more  into  detail ; 
his  '  Observations  on  the  State  of  the  Nation,'  and  his  speech  on 
'  P^conomical  Reform,'  are  not  superficial  productions,  but  discuss 
their  respective  topics  with  the  fulness  of  a  speech  on  the  Budget 


EDMUND   BURKE.  453 

Clearness,  Perspicuity. — His  earlier  writings  are  arranged  with 
great  clearness.  His  later  works,  like  Carlyle's  political  rhap- 
sodies, are  less  perspicuous.  He  was  aware  of  the  importance  of 
method  ;  in  his  '  Reflections  on  the  French  Revolution,'  he  adopted 
the  form  of  a  letter  advisedly,  that  he  might  have  greater  scope. 
"  A  different  plan,  he  was  sensible,  might  have  been  more  favour- 
able to  a  commodious  division  and  distribution  of  the  matter." 
In  such  a  work,  rigid  obedience  to  a  plan  would  have  been  a  cold 
obstruction  to  the  warm  flow  of  his  eloquence. 

Precision. — It  may  be  doubted  whether,  with  all  his  industry,  he 
had  patience  enough  to  be  a  precise  writer.  His  treatise  on  the 
'  Sublime  and  Beautiful '  is  very  much  wanting  in  the  exactness 
required  for  scientific  discussion.  He  shows  himself  conscious  of 
the  principle  that  in  scientific  writing  each  word  should  be  used  in 
a  definite  sense ;  and  himself  proposes  to  give  the  loose  word  "  de- 
light "  a  distinctive  signification ;  but  before  many  pages  are  over 
he  violates  his  own  definition. 

Strength. — Strength  is  the  prominent  quality  in  Burke's  style, 
as  it  is  in  our  literature  generally.  The  peculiar  mode  is  difficult 
to  express ;  but  it  may  be  said  that  Burke's  strength  has  some- 
thing of  the  quality  of  Macaulay's,  although  possessing  greater 
body  and  less  rapidity  and  point  We  have  already  mentioned 
the  similarity  in  the  structure  of  their  sentences.  They  have  also 
a  similar  declamatory  energy,  a  similar  concreteness,  and  some- 
thing of  the  same  mixture  of  original  turns  of  expression  with  a 
copious  use  of  stock-phrases.  Before  we  can  feel  the  resemblance, 
we  must  leave  out  of  sight  the  differences  in  opinion  and  in  depth 
and  range  of  thought ;  when  we  succeed  in  disregarding  these 
differences  in  subject-matter,  the  resemblance  otherwise  is  very 
striking. 

The  following  is  a  fair  specimen  of  the  general  style  of  the 
'  Reflections.1  In  it  we  can  easily  trace  all  the  above  points  of 
resemblance  to  Macaulay : — 

"  I  find  a  preacher  of  the  Gospel  profaning  the  beautiful  and  prophetic 
ejaculation  commonly  called  nuiic  dimittis,  made  on  the  first  presentation  of 
our  Saviour  in  the  Temple,  and  applying  it  with  an  inhuman  and  unnatural 
rapture,  to  the  most  horrid,  atrocious,  and  afflicting  spectacle  that  perhaps 
ever  was  exhibited  to  the  pity  and  indignation  of  manic ind.  This  'leading 
in  triumph,'  a  thing  in  its  best  form  unmanly  and  irreligious,  which  tills 
our  preacher  with  such  unhallowed  transports,  must  shock,  I  believe,  the 
moral  taste  of  every  well-born  mind.  Several  English  were  the  stupefied 
and  indignant  spectators  of  that  triumph.  It  was  (unless  we  have  been 
strangely  deceived)  a  spectacle  more  resembling  a  procession  of  American 
savages,  entering  into  Onondago,  after  some  of  their  murders  called  victories, 
and  leading  into  hovels  hung  round  with  scalps,  their  captives,  overpowered 
with  the  scoffs  and  buffets  of  women  as  ferocious  as  themselves,  much  more 
•Mian  it  resembled  the  triumphal  pomp  of  a  civilised,  martial  nation  ; — if  a 
civilised  nation,  or  any  men  who  had  a  sense  of  generosity,  were  capable  of 


454  FROM  1760  TO  1790. 

a  personal  triumph  over  the  fallen  and  the  afflicted.  ...  I  must  believe 
that  the  National  Assembly  find  themselves  in  a  state  of  the  greatest  humili- 
ation in  not  being  able  to  punish  the  authors  of  this  triumph  or  the  actors 
in  it ;  and  that  they  are  in  a  situation  in  which  any  inquiry  they  may  mak« 
upon  the  subject  must  be  destitute  even  of  the  appearance  of  liberty  or  im- 
partiality. The  apology  of  that  Assembly  is  found  in  their  situation  ;  !>ut 
when  we  approve  what  they  must  bear,  it  is  in  us  the  degenerate  choice  ot  \ 
vitiated  mind.  ( 

' '  With  a  compelled  appearance  of  deliberation  they  vote  under  the 
dominion  of  a  stern  necessity.  They  sit  in  the  heart,  as  it  were,  of  a 
foreign  republic  ;  they  have  their  residence  in  a  city  whose  constitution  has 
emanated  neither  from  the  charter  of  their  king,  nor  from  their  legislative 
power.  There  they  are  surrounded  by  an  army  not  raised  either  by  the 
authority  of  their  crown,  or  by  their  command  ;  and  which,  if  they  should 
order  to  dissolve  itself,  would  instantly  dissolve  them.  There  they  sit,  after 
a  gang  of  assassins  had  driven  away  some  hundreds  of  the  members  ;  whilst 
those  who  held  the  same  moderate  principles,  with  more  patience  or  better 
hope,  continued  every  day  exposed  to  outrageous  insults  and  murderous 
threats.  There  a  majority,  sometimes  real,  sometimes  pretended,  captive 
itself,  compels  a  captive  king  to  issue  as  royal  edicts,  at  third  hand,  the 
polluted  nonsense  of  their  most  licentious  and  giddy  coffee-houses.  It  is 
notorious  that  all  their  measures  are  decided  before  they  are  debated.  It  is 
beyond  doubt  that  under  the  terror  of  the  bayonet,  and  the  lamp-post,  and 
the  torch  to  their  houses,  they  are  obliged  to  adopt  all  the  crude  and  des- 
perate measures  suggested  by  clubs  composed  of  a  monstrous  medley  of  all 
conditions,  tongues,  and  nations.  Among  these  are  found  persons,  in  com- 
parison of  whom  Catiline  would  be  thought  scrupulous,  and  Cethegus  a  man 
of  sobriety  and  moderation.  Nor  is  it  in  the  clubs  alone  that  the  public 
measures  are  deformed  into  monsters.  They  undergo  a  previous  distortion 
in  academies,  intended  as  so  many  seminaries  for  these  clubs,  which  are  set 
up  in  all  the  places  of  public  resort.  In  these  meetings  of  all  sorts,  every 
counsel,  in  proportion  as  it  is  daring,  and  violent,  and  perfidious,  is  taken 
for  a  mark  of  superior  genius.  Humanity  and  compassion  are  ridiculed  as 
the  fruits  of  superstition  and  ignorance.  Tenderness  to  individuals  is 
considered  as  treason  to  the  public.  Liberty  is  always  to  be  estimated  per- 
fect as  property  is  rendered  insecure.  Amidst  assassination,  massacre,  and 
confiscation,  perpetrated  or  meditated,  they  are  forming  plans  for  the  good 
order  of  future  society.  Embracing  in  their  arms  the  carcases  of  baso 
criminals,  and  promoting  their  relations  on  the  title  of  their  offences,  they 
drive  hundreds  of  virtuous  persons  to  the  same  end,  by  forcing  them  to  sub- 
sist by  beggary  or  by  crime." 

In  passages  specially  laboured,  where  Burke's  individual  genius 
is  at  its  height,  and  the  figures  and  turns  of  expression  are  peculi- 
arly his  own,  we  cannot  profess  to  trace  any  appreciable  likeness. 
The  following  is  quoted  by  De  Quincey,  with  the  remark  that 
Burke  is  said  to  have  acknowledged  spending  more  labour  upon 
it  than  upon  any  passage  in  all  his  writings,  and  to  have  been 
tolerably  satisfied  with  the  result: — 

' '  As  long  as  the  well-compacted  structure  of  our  Church  and  State,  the 
sanctuary,  the  holy  of  holies  of  that  ancient  law,  defended  by  reverence, 
defended  by  power,  a  fortress  at  once  and  a  temple,  shall  stand  inviolate  on 
the  brow  of  the  British  Zion  ;  as  long  as  the  British  monarchy,  not  more 
limited  than  fenced  by  the  orders  of  the  State,  shall,  like  the  proud  keep  of 


EDMUND   BURKE.  455 

Windsor,  rising  In  the  majesty  of  proportion,  and  girt  with  the  donble  belt 
of  its  kindred  and  coeval  towers,  as  long  as  this  awful  structure  shall  over- 
see and  guard  the  subjected  land,  so  long  the  mounds  and  dykes  of  the  low 
flat  Bedford  level  will  have  nothing  to  fear  from  all  the  pickaxes  of  all  the 
levellers  of  France.  As  long  as  our  sovereign  lord  the  king,  and  his  faithful 
subjects  the  lords  and  commons  of  this  realm,  the  triple  cord  which  no  man 
can  break  ;  the  solemn  sworn  constitutional  frank  -pledge  of  this  nation ;  the 
firm  guarantees  of  each  other's  being  and  each  other's  lights  ;  the  joint  and 
several  securities,  each  in  its  place  and  order  for  every  kind  and  every 
quality  of  property  and  of  dignity, — as  long  as  these  endure,  so  long  the 
Duke  of  Bedford  is  safe,  and  we  are  all  safe  together ;  the  high  from  the 
blights  of  envy  and  the  spoliation  of  rapacity  ;  the  low  from  the  iron  hand 
of  oppression  and  the  insolent  spurn  of  contempt.  Amen  !  and  so  be  it : 
and  so  it  will  be, 

'  Dam  domus  JEnesz  Capitoli  immobile  saxnm 
Accolet ;  imperiumque  pater  Romauus  habebit.'  " 

The  great  element  of  power  in  Burke,  over  and  above  what  he 
has  in  common  with  Macaulay,  is  his  extravagant  splendour  of 
imagery.  This,  especially  in  the  picked  passages  usually  quoted 
from  him,  gives  such  a  flavour  to  his  composition,  that  readers, 
forming  their  judgment  upon  these  passages,  would  refuse  to 
believe  how  much  Macaulay  had  made  him  a  model.  He  rises 
to  a  pitch  of  wild  excitement  that  Macaulay  was  incapable  of. 
The  images  thrown  off  in  these  ungovernable  moments  were  such 
as  Macaulay  could  never  have  imitated.  The  following,  from  the 
'Letters  on  a  Regicide  Peace,'  describing  the  embassy  to  the 
French  Minister,  is  a  well-known  quotation : — 

"  To  those  who  do  not  love  to  contemplate  the  fall  of  human  greatness, 
I  do  not  know  a  more  mortifying  spectacle  than  to  see  the  assembled 
majesty  of  the  crowned  heads  of  Europe  waiting  as  patient  suitors  in  the 
ante-chamber  of  regicide.  They  wait,  it  seems,  until  the  sanguinary  tyrant 
Carnot  shall  have  snorted  away  the  fumes  of  the  indigested  blood  of  his 
sovereign.  Then,  when,  sunk  on  the  down  of  usurped  pomp,  he  shall  have 
sufficiently  indulged  his  meditations  with  what  monarch  he  shall  next  glut 
his  ravening  maw,  he  may  condescend  to  signify  that  it  is  his  pleasure  to  be 
awake  ;  and  that  he  is  at  leisure  to  receive  the  proposals  of  his  high  and 
mighty  clients  for  the  terms  on  which  he  may  respite  the  execution  of  the 
•entence  he  has  passed  upon  them.  At  the  opening  of  those  doors,  what  a 
sight  it  must  be  to  behold  the  plenipotentiaries  of  royal  impotence,  in  tho 
precedency  which  they  will  intrigue  to  obtain,  and  which  will  be  granted  to 
them  according  to  the  seniority  of  their  degradation,  sneaking  into  tho 
regicide  presence,  and,  with  the  relics  of  the  smile,  which  they  had  dressed 
up  for  the  levee  of  their  masters,  still  flickering  on  their  curled  lips,  present- 
ing the  faded  remains  of  their  courtly  graces,  to  meet  the  scornful,  ferocious, 
sardonic  grin  of  a  bloody  ruffian,  who,  whilst  he  is  receiving  their  homage, 
is  measuring  them  with  his  eye,  and  fitting  to  their  size  the  slider  of  his 
guillotine  !  These  ambassadors  may  easily  return  as  good  courtiers  as  they 
went :  but  can  they  ever  return  from  that  degrading  residence,  loyal  and 
faithful  subjects ;  or  with  any  true  affection  to  their  master,  or  true  attach- 
ment to  the  constitution,  religion,  or  laws  of  their  country  ?  There  is  gu-at 
danger  that  they,  who  enter  smiling  into  this  Trophonian  cave,  will  come 
out  of  it  sad  and  serious  conspirators  ;  and  such ,  will  continue  as  long 


456  FROM  1760  TO   1790. 

as  they  live.  Thay  will  become  true  conductors  of  contagion  to  every 
country  which  has  had  the  misfortune  to  send  them  to  the  source  of  that 
electricity." 

Pathos. — Burke  is  often  said  to  excel  in  pathos  as  in  every  other 
quality  of  style ;  but  if  we  take  tranquillity  and  composure  to  be 
part  of  the  essence  of  pathos,  there  is  very  little  of  it  to  be  found 
within  the  range  of  his  published  works.  It  was  inconsistent  with 
his  purposes  as  an  orator  to  draw  soothing  pictures  of  distress.  In 
the  conclusion  of  the  celebrated  Begum  charge  in  the  trial  of 
Warren  Hastings,  he  is  said  to  have  made  "  an  affecting  appeal 
to  the  feelings  and  the  passions  of  their  lordships ; "  but  his 
object  was  to  horrify  and  inflame  them,  not  to  fill  them  with 
luxurious  feelings  of  compassion.  The  soft  tranquillity  of  patlios 
was  inconsistent  with  his  purposes  as  an  orator.  It  was  no  less 
inconsistent  with  his  nature.  An  excitable  man,  of  ungovern- 
able sensibility,  when  his  feelings  were  moved  he  was  ever  prone 
to  run  into  wild  extravagance.  He  probably  possessed  the  power 
of  communicating  his  own  excitement  to  such  as  were  not  repelled 
by  it ;  but  the  effect  produced  went  very  far  beyond  the  tranquil 
borders  of  pathos. 

His  well-known  allusion  to  Marie  Antoinette  is  very  touching, 
but  it  touches  our  sensibilities  more  keenly  than  pathos.  The 
emotion  cannot  sustain  itself  in  the  melting  inood,  but  passes  into 
fiery  indignation. 

The  Ludicrous. — During  his  quarter  of  a  century  of  polemical 
life,  he  made  abundant  use  of  the  weapon  of  ridicule.  In  his 
earlier  writings  he  had  recourse  chiefly  to  dignified  irony — irony 
that  shows  no  great  wit,  but  is  always  pleasing  and  effective  from 
the  copiousness  and  vigour  of  the  language.  The  ridicule  of  his 
later  writings,  of  which  we  have  had  a  specimen  in  the  quotations 
from  his  '  Letter  to  a  Noble  Lord,'  is  extravagantly  excited  and 
personal.  "  If  by  wit,"  says  Mr  Rogers,  "  be  meant  any  of  its 
lighter  and  more  playful  species,  then  it  can  hardly  be  doubted 
that  in  these  Burke  did  not  excel ;  at  least  whatever  powers  of 
this  kind  he  might  possess,  they  were  in  no  sort  of  proportion  to 
his  other  intellectual  endowments.  It  is  true  that  Burke  was  fond 
of  punning ;  his  success,  however,  was  not  equal  to  his  ardour  in 
the  pursuit  Again,  if  by  wit  be  meant  that  caustic  and  subtle 
irony,  which  is  the  more  powerful  from  the  calmness  of  the  style, 
and  stings  the  deeper  from  the  collected  manner  of  him  who  utters 
it — neither  did  Burke  possess  much  of  this.  But  if  by  wit  be 
meant  any  of  its  forms  compatible  with  fierce  invective,  his 
speeches  abound  with  innumerable  instances  of  the  highest  merit." 
His  invective,  as  we  see  in  his  attack  upon  the  Duke  of  Bedford, 
is  of  the  most  direct  and  unvarnished  kind.  He  does  not  scruple 
tc  make  the  most  grossly  offensive  comparisons  in  the  plainest 


EDMUND   BURKE.  457 

terms.  Frequently,  indeed,  by  his  vehemence,  he  defeated  his 
own  ends.  Only  partisans  could  have  applauded  his  recrimina- 
tions on  the  Duke  of  Bedford,  and  his  unmeasured  abuse  of 
Hastings  provoked  a  reaction  in  favour  of  the  victim. 

The  following  are  examples  of  the  licence  that  he  ventured  to 
take  in  his  invective  against  Hastings.  We  quote  from  the  collec- 
tion of  his  speeches : — 

"  What  (said  Mr  Burke)  could  make  this  proud  and  haughty  ruler  of  India 
submit  to  such  language,  and  bear  with  such  opprobrium  ?  Guilt,  conscious 
guilt !  The  cursed  love  of  money  had  got  possession  of  his  soul ;  and  in  the 
contemplation  of  his  detested  wealth,  he  found  sufficient  consolation  for  the 
loss  of  character  and  of  honour.  Under  the  lash  of  Sir  John  Clavering,  and 
the  execration  of  all  Asia,  he  seemed  to  say  with  the  poet — 

• Populus  me  sibilat,  at  mihi  plaudo 

Ipse  domi,  simul  ac  nummos  contemplor  in  area.'  1 

It  was  this  love  of  money  that  made  him  deaf  to  the  calls  of  glory,  and 
callous  to  the  feelings  of  honour.  It  was  this  unbounded  and  insatiable 

Iussion  for  money  that  had  seared  his  conscience  and  his  feelings ;  and 
liippy  in  the  accumulation  of  wealth,  even  by  the  foulest  means,  he  could 
bear,  unmoved,  the  most  cutting  reproaches  of  Sir  John  Claverinjr.  He  lay 
down  in  his  sty  of  infamy,  wallowed  in  the  filth  of  disgrace,  and  fattened 
upon  the  offals  and  excrements  of  dishonour." 


"  Mr  Burke  then  cited  passages  from  a  variety  of  oriental  authors,  prov- 
ing the  right  of  property  in  India,  and  showing  that  that  property  had  been 
respecteil  by  the  greatest  princes  and  conquerors,  by  Tamerlane,  Gengis 
Khan,  Khouli  Khan,  and  others.  But  (said  Mr  Burke)  the  Council  have 
fancied  that  we  compared  Air  Hastings  to  Tamerlane  and  others,  and  they 
have  told  your  lordships  of  the  thousands  of  men  slaughtered  by  the  ambi- 
tion of  those  princes.  Good  God  !  have  they  lost  their  senses  ?  Can  they 
euppose  that  we  meant  to  compare  a  fraudulent  maker  of  bullock-contracts 
with  an  illustrious  conqueror  ?  We  never  compared  Hastings  to  a  lion  or  a 
tiger  ;  we  have  compared  liim  to  a  rat  or  a  weasel.  When  we  assimilate  him 
to  such  contemptible  animals,  we  do  not  mean  to  convey  an  idea  of  their 
incapability  of  doing  injury.  When  God  punished  Pharaoh  and  Egypt,  it 
was  not  by  armies,  but  by  locusts  and  by  lice,  which,  though  small  and 
contemptible,  are  capable  of  the  greatest  mischiefs." 

Such  puerile  meanness  of  invective  must  inevitably  recoil  upon 
the  author.  In  a  cooler  frame  of  mind,  Burke  himself  would 
have  been  the  first  to  condemn  it ;  and  we  cannot  suppose  that 
he  ever  indulged  in  it  without  to  some  extent  bullying  his  artistic 
as  well  as  his  prudential  conscience. 

His  fury  against  Hastings  carried  him  to  lengths  still  more 
outrageous : — 

"  He  made  some  very  sarcastic  similes  as  to  the  connection  between  Mr 
Hastings  and  the  Begums,  quoting  Dean  Swift's  'Progress  of  Love'  aa 

1  "  The  people  hiss  me,  but  when  I  go  home  and  feast  my  eyes  upon  the  coins 
in  my  safe,  I  cry  '  Bravo  ! '  to  myself." 


458  FROM   1760  TO    1790. 

npplicable  on  the  occnsion.  The  humour  touching  the  Manny  Begnm 
flowed  something  in  this  way  :  '  Age  has  its  comforts — the  consolations  of 
debility  and  ugliness  m:iy  be  found  in  brandy.  The  old  lady  had  therein  a 
monopoly.  She  was  a  great  dealer  in  the  article.  But  mark  the  transition 
— a  youth  of  sentiment  and  love ;  an  old  age  reposing  upon  the  brandy-cask." 
He  then  ironically  adverted  to  the  passion  of  great  men  for  strumpets. 
'Antony  had  his  Cleopatra,  and  Mr  Hastings  his  Munny  Begum.  It  might 
be  so;  for  aged,  shrivelled,  bony  deformity  had  its  relish  for  some  palates; 
but,  good  God  !  no  man  ever  fell  in  love  with  his  own  banyan  1  ! '  " 

We  have  seen  that  he  compared  Hastings  to  a  wallowing  sow. 
He  also  compared  him  to  "  the  keeper  of  a  pig-sty,  wallowing 
in  filth  and  corruption."  Towards  the  conclusion  he  became  so 
violent  as  to  apply  the  epithets  "  rogue,  common  cheat,  swindler  " ; 
and  to  declare — "  You  must  repeal  this  Act  of  Parliament,  you 
must  declare  the  Legislature  a  liar,  before  you  can  acquit  Warren 
Hastings." 

Taste.  —  In  his  more  excited  compositions  Burke  frequently 
offends  against  good  tasta  His  abuse  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford, 
of  Warren  Hastings,  and  of  the  principal  actors  in  the  French 
Revolution,  is  often  outrageously  coarse.  His  comparison  of  the 
Duke  to  a  whale,  his  comparison  of  Hastings  to  a  sow,  and  hia 
imagining  Carnot  to  have  drunk  the  blood  of  a  king,  and  to  be 
"snorting  away  the  fumes  of  indigestion"  in  consequence,  cannot 
be  paralleled  except  from  "  the  scolding  of  the  ancients " ;  and 
these  are  not  perhaps  his  worst  violations  of  taste.  Lord  Brougham 
produces  the  following  tit-bit  concerning  Mr  Dundas : — 

"With  six  great  chopping  bastards"  ('Reports  of  Secret  Committee'), 
"each  as  lusty  as  an  infant  Hercules,  this  delicate  creature  blushes  at  the 
sight  of  his  new  bridegroom,  assumes  a  virgin  delicacy;  or  to  use  a  more 
fit,  as  well  as  a  more  poetical,  comparison,  the  person  so  squeamish,  so 
timid,  so  trembling  lest  the  winds  of  heaven  should  visit  too  rousjhly,  is 
expanded  to  broad  sunshine,  exposed  like  the  sow  of  imperial  augury,  lying 
in  the  mud  with  all  the  prodigies  of  her  fertility  about  her,  as  evidence  of 
her  delicate  amour." 

These  occasional  infractions  of  taste,  gross  though  they  be,  must 
not  be  allowed  to  detract  from  his  just  fame  as  "  the  supreme 
writer  of  his  century."  Taste  is  certainly  not  the  special  virtue 
of  English  literature :  there  is  none  of  our  greatest  masters  of 
prose  that  does  not  offend  in  some  particular.  Burke  was  far 
from  being  prone  "  to  revolve  ideas  from  which  other  minds 
shrink  with  disgust,"  at  least  in  cold  blood ;  only  when  excited 
he  could  not  find  images  too  disgusting  to  express  his  aversion. 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Description. — Burke's  descriptive  forte  is  very  like  Macaulay's. 
There  is  no  method  in  his  descriptions ;  his  works  contain  none  of 

1  "  MmiHy-liroker." 


EDMUND   BURKE.  459 

the  elaborate  word-painting  to  be  found  in  farlyle  :  but  he  details 
impressive  circumstances  with  his  characteristic  fulness  of  expres- 
sion, and  profusion  and  boldness  of  imagery. 

He  gives  the  following  picturesque  account  of  the  ancient 
manner  of  catering  for  the  royal  household : — 

"These  old  establishments  were  formed  also  on  a  third  principle,  stiD 
more  adverse  to  the  living  economy  of  the  age.  They  were  formed,  sir,  on 
the  principle  of  purveyance,  and  receipt  in  kind.  In  former  days,  when  the 
household  was  vast,  and  the  supply  scanty  and  precarious,  the  royal  pur- 
veyors, sallying  forth  from  under  the  Gothic  portcullis  to  purchase  provision 
with  power  and  prerogative  instead  of  money,  brought  home  the  plunder  of 
a  hundred  markets,  and  all  that  could  be  seized  from  a  flying  and  hiding 
country ;  and  deposited  their  spoils  in  a  hundred  caverns,  with  each  its 
keeper. " 

The  present  condition  of  the  royal  palaces  he  describes  as 
follows : — 

"  But  when  the  reason  of  old  establishments  is  gone,  it  is  absurd  to  pre- 
serve nothing  but  the  burthen  of  them.  .  .  .  Our  palaces  are  vast, 
inhospitable  halls.  There  the  bleak  winds,  there  'Boreas,  and  Eurus,  and 
Caurus,  and  Argestes  loud,'  howling  through  the  vacant  lobbies,  and  clat- 
tering the  doors  of  deserted  guard-rooms,  appal  the  imagination,  and  conjure 
up  the  grim  spectres  of  departed  tyrants — the  Saxon,  the  Norman,  and  the 
Dane  ;  the  stern  Edwards  and  fierce  Henries — who  stalk  from  desolation  to 
desolation,  through  the  dreary  vacuity,  and  melancholy  succession  of  chill 
and  comfortless  chambers.  .  .  .  They  put  me  in  mind  of  Old  Sarum, 
where  the  representatives,  more  in  number  than  the  constituents,  only  serve 
to  inform  us  that  this  was  once  a  place  of  trade,  and  sounding  with  '  the 
busy  hum  of  men,'  though  now  you  can  only  trace  the  streets  by  the  colour 
of  the  corn  ;  and  its  sole  manufacture  is  in  members  of  Parliament." 

Persuasion. — Our  author's  qualifications  as  an  orator  are  elabo- 
rately analysed  by  Mr  Rogers,  from  whom  we  make  the  following 
extracts : — 

"  As  an  orator,  Burke  will  never  be  ranked  among  the  very  first 
masters  of  the  art,  so  long  as  the  professed  object  of  oratory  shall 
be  conviction  and  persuasion.  Not  that  we  for  a  moment  assert 
that  the  degree  of  eloquence  possessed  by  an  orator  is  always  to 
be  estimated  by  his  success.  By  no  means ;  for  as  on  the  one 
hand  there  are  many  cases  in  which  the  divinest  eloquence  will  in 
vain  contend  against  the  prejudices  of  an  audience  predetermined 
not  to  be  convinced,  so  there  are  many  where  the  passions  have 
already  spoken  more  eloquently  than  the  orator.  The  question,  in 
such  instances,  is  not  how  much,  but  how  little,  oratorical  skill  is 
necessary  to  success." — Treating  eloquence  and  oratorical  skill  as 
synonymous — a  somewhat  questionable  usage — Mr  Rogers  goes  on 
to  remark  that  Burke's  eloquence  was  not  "adapted  to  produce 
success." 

For  purposes  of  persuasion  he  erred  in  not  appealing  to  prin- 
ciples of  action.  He  allowed  his  reason  and  his  imagination  to 


460  FROM   1760  TO    1790. 

play  freely  upon  the  subject,  and  did  not  confine  himself  to  the 
orator's  chief  end — namely,  to  guide  his  audience  to  a  particular 
resolution.  "  He  can  seldom  confine  himself  to  a  simple  business- 
like view  of  the  subject  under  discussion,  or  to  close,  rapid,  com- 
pressed argumentation  on  it.  On  the  contrary,  he  makes  bound- 
less excursions  into  all  the  regions  of  moral  and  political  philosophy; 
is  perpetually  tracing  up  particular  instances  and  subordinate  prin- 
ciples to  profound  and  comprehensive  maxims ;  amplifying  and 
expanding  the  most  meagre  materials  into  brief  but  comprehensive 
dissertations  of  political  science,  and  incrusting  (so  to  speak)  the 
nucleus  of  the  most  insignificant  fact  with  the  most  exquisite 
crystallisations  of  truth;  while  the  whole  composition  glitters 
and  sparkles  again  with  a  rich  profusion  of  moral  reflections, 
equally  beautiful  and  just."  "  His  exuberance  of  fancy "  was 
"  equally  unfavourable  to  the  attainment  of  the  highest  oratorical 
excellence.  When  a  speaker  indulges  in  very  lengthened  or  elab- 
orate imagery,  a  suspicion  is  sure  to  be  engendered  (and,  except 
in  one  or  two  instances  of  very  extraordinary  mental  structure, 
that  suspicion  is  uniformly  just)  that  he  is  scarcely  in  earnest; 
that  if  he  has  an  object,  it  is  to  commend  his  own  eloquence 
rather  than  to  convince  his  audience;  that  his  inspiration  is  not 
the  inspiration  of  nature  ;  and  for  this  very  sufficient  reason,  that 
it  is  not  natural  for  intense  emotion  to  express  itself  in  the  fan- 
tastic forms  of  laboured  imagery.  .  .  .  When  illustration  is 
very  abundant  and  elaborate,  even  the  admiration  it  may  excite 
will  often  be  anything  but  friendly  to  the  speaker's  professed  object, 
nay,  the  very  reverse ;  the  admiration  will  resemble  that  which  is 
excited  by  a  fine  piece  of  poetry.  .  .  .  That  it  is  possible  to 
indulge  in  such  exuberance  of  illustration,  as  to  suspend  the  cur- 
rent of  strong  passions,  and  defeat  the  orator's  avowed  object,  it  is 
needless  to  say." 

Farther,  he  was  either  ignorant  of  the  feelings  of  his  audience, 
or  too  vehement  and  self-willed  to  try  to  conciliate  them.  "  As  a 
political  tactician,  Burke  was  far  inferior  to  many  of  his  contem- 
I>oraries.  There  was,  in  fact,  a  singular  disproportion  between  his 
knowledge  of  human  nature  in  general,  and  his  knowledge  of  in- 
dividual character;  or,  if  he  possessed  the  latter  at  all,  he  was 
strangely  incapable  of  using  it  to  any  practical  purpose.  None 
understood  better  than  he  did,  that  abstract  principles  of  policy 
must  be  modified  by  actually  existing  circumstances;  yet  this 
very  same  maxim,  of  such  profound  truth  and  such  immense 
value,  he  showed  a  singular  inability  to  apply  to  individual  con- 
duct, on  the  small  scale  and  within  the  limited  sphere  of  parties. 
In  the  conduct  of  any  measure,  he  never  deigned  to  consult  pre- 
judices or  to  soften  enmity.  He  had  no  patience  to  bear  with  folly; 
he  was  only  irritated  by  it  So  far  from  any  attempt  to  conciliate 


OLIVER  GOLDSMITH.  461 

his  political  opponents,  he  often  exasperated  hostility  by  setting 
them  all  at  open  defiance,  and  would  frequently  pour  out  the  most 
bitter  scorn  and  invective,  when  the  most  guarded  and  temperate 
style  of  expression  was  essential  to  success.  Never  checking  tho 
impetuosity  of  his  passions,  he  often  contended  for  mere  trifles 
with  a  pertinacity  which  could  only  have  been  justified  in  the 
defence  of  principles  of  vital  importance ;  trifles,  the  timely  and 
graceful  concession  of  which  would  have  insured  success,  which 
would  have  far  more  than  counterbalanced  such  a  sacrifice.  He 
never  seemed  nicely  to  calculate,  with  a  view  to  his  own  conduct, 
the  temper  and  conduct  of  the  House,  or  the  exact  relation  of 
parties  in  it;  thus  he  never  cared  to  conceal  or  disguise  his 
opinions  on  any  subject  whatever,  but  uniformly  expressed  them 
boldly  and  fully.  Now,  though  we  may  admire  the  blunt  hon- 
esty of  such  conduct,  none  can  commend  its  prudence;  nothing 
but  the  most  imperious  necessity  could  justify  it." 

OLIVER  GOLDSMITH,  1728-1774. 

Goldsmith's  life  offers  an  exception  to  the  usual  even  tenor  of 
the  literary  career.  His  fortunes  were  as  chequered  as  restless 
imprudence  and  romantic  generosity  could  make  them.  His  father 
was  a  good-hearted  Irish  clergyman,  the  supposed  original  of 
Dr  Primrose  in  the  'Vicar  of  Wakefield,'  and  of  the  kindly  old 
preacher  in  the  '  Deserted  Village.'  Oliver  was  born  at  Pallas,  in 
Longford,  the  fourth  of  a  family  of  seven.  When  he  was  two 
years  old  his  father  removed  to  the  more  comfortable  living  of 
Lissoy,  in  West  Meath.  His  first  teacher  was  a  garrulous  old 
soldier,  who  had  served  under  Marlborough,  and  delighted  to  en- 
tertain the  boys  with  tales  of  marvellous  adventure.  He  entered 
Trinity  College,  Dublin,  as  a. sizar,  in  the  year  of  the  great  Jaco- 
bite rising,  1745.  What  he  afterwards  said  of  Parnell's  college 
course  may  be  applied  to  his  own — "  His  progress  through  the 
college  course  of  study  was  probably  marked  with  but  little  splen- 
dour ;  his  imagination  might  have  been  too  warm  to  relish  the 
cold  logic  of  Burgersdicius,  or  the  dreary  subtleties  of  Smiglesius ; 
but  it  is  certain  that  as  a  classical  scholar  few  could  equal  him." 
He  had  no  liking  for  mathematics,  but,  as  he  afterwards  boasted, 
he  could  "  turn  an  ode  of  Horace  with  any  of  them."  He  is  said 
to  have  more  than  once  been  in  difficulties  with  the  heads  of  the 
college  from  his  love  of  boisterous  frolic.  He  left  college  with  no 
fixed  aim.  His  father  designed  him  for  the  Church,  but  after  he 
had  spent  two  years  at  home  in  preparation,  he  failed  to  give 
satisfaction  to  the  bishop,  and  could  not  obtain  orders.  He  next 
thought  of  the  law,  and  set  off  for  London  ;  but  falling  into  good 
company  at  Dublin,  he  spent  all  his  money  there,  and  returned 


462  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

home  in  disgrace.  He  was  then  fitted  out  for  the  study  of  medi- 
cine in  Edinburgh,  but  was  much  too  restless  to  pass  decorously 
through  the  ordinary  curriculum  and  settle  down  into  a  quiet 
practice.  After  studying  (or  at  least  staying)  two  years  in  Edin- 
burgh, he  went  off  to  the  Continent,  and  spent  some  time  in  the 
medical  schools  of  Leyden  and  Louvain.  Thereafter,  in  a  restless 
spirit  of  adventure,  he  wandered  through  Switzerland,  Italy,  and 
France,  supporting  himself  mainly,  it  is  said,  by  playing  on  the 
flute  for  food  and  lodging.  In  1756  he  returned  to  London,  and 
there  tried  various  ways  of  making  a  livelihood ;  being  succes- 
sively assistant  to  an  apothecary,  physician  (among  the  poorer 
orders),  proof  corrector  in  Richardson's  press,  usher  in  Dr  Milner'a 
school  at  Peckham,  critic  for  the  '  Monthly  Review,'  and  usher 
again.  In  1 7.58  he  tried  to  pass  at  Surgeon's  Hall  as  a  hospital 
mate,  but  was  rejected,  and  thus  driven  back  finally  on  literature. 
His  first  independent  work  was  '  The  Inquiry  into  the  State  of 
Polite  Learning  in  Europe,"  which  appeared  anonymously  in  1759. 
From  that  date  till  his  death,  in  1774,  he  received  steady  work 
from  the  booksellers,  and  but  for  his  imprudent  generosity  and  love 
of  finery,  might  have  lived  in  comfort,  if  not  in  luxury.  His  chief 
productions  were — '  The  Bee,'  a  weekly  periodical,  which  reached 
only  eight  numbers,  lasting  through  October  and  November,  1759; 
'Chinese  Letters,'  contributed  to  Newbery's  'Public  Ledger'  in 
1760,  and  afterwards  published  separately  under  the  title  of  'The 
Citizen  of  the  World ' ;  '  The  History  of  England,  in  a  series  of 
Letters  from  a  Nobleman  to  his  Son,'  1762  ;  '  The  Vicar  of  Wake- 
field,'  written  and  sold  in  1764,  but  not  published  till  1766  ;  'The 
Traveller,'  1764;  the  comedy  of  'The  Good-Natured  Man,'  per- 
formed in  1768;  'History  of  Rome,'  1769;  ' The  Deserted  Village,' 
1770;  'History  of  England,'  in  four  volumes,  1771 ;  'She  Stoops 
to  Conquer,'  performed  in  1773;  'History  of  Animated  Nature,' 
1774- 

"  The  Doctor,"  as  he  was  called,  had  not  a  handsome  exterior. 
Miss  Reynolds  once  toasted  him  as  "  the  ugliest  man  she  knew." 
Boswell  says — "  His  person  was  short,  his  countenance  coarse  and 
vulgar,  his  deportment  that  of  the  scholar  awkwardly  affecting  the 
easy  gentleman."  Judge  Day's  description  is  more  favourable: 
"  In  person  he  was  short — about  five  feet  five  or  six  inches ;  strong 
but  not  heavy  in  make ;  rather  fair  in  complexion,  with  brown 
hair — such,  at  least,  as  could  be  distinguished  from  his  wig.  His 
features  were  plain  but  not  repulsive — certainly  not  so  when 
lighted  up  by  conversation.  His  manners  were  simple,  natural, 
and  perhaps  on  the  whole,  we  may  say,  not  polished ;  at  least, 
without  the  refinement  and  good-breeding  which  the  exquisite 
polish  of  his  compositions  would  lead  us  to  expect." 


OLIVKll   GOLDSMITH.  463 

His  naturally  strong  constitution  was  soon  impaired  by  his 
hardships.  At  the  age  of  thirty-one  he  wrote  thus  to  his  brother  : 
"Though  I  never  had  a  day's  sickness  since  I  saw  you,  yet  1  am 
not  that  strong  active  man  you  once  knew  me.  You  scarcely  can 
conceive  how  much  eight  years  of  disappointment,  anguish,  and 
study,  have  worn  me  down."  The  climate  of  London  was  trying 
to  him,  and  he  frequently  had  to  recruit  by  taking  lodgings  in  the 
country. 

The  strong  points  of  Goldsmith's  intellect  centred  in  his  power 
of  easy  and  graceful  literary  composition.  He  was  not  a  profound 
scholar,  and  his  mind  was  neither  very  comprehensive  nor  very 
productive.  His  fame  rests  upon  the  charms  of  his  style  :  he  tried 
nearly  every  kind  of  composition — poetry,  comedy,  fiction,  history, 
essay-writing,  natural  science — and,  as  Johnson  said  in  his  well- 
known  epitaph,  "  whatever  he  touched  he  adorned."  He  criticised, 
as  he  wrote,  with  exquisite  taste.  The  fragments  that  Mr  Forster 
has  reprinted  from  the  '  Monthly  Review,'  Goldsmith's  earliest 
performances,  are  models  of  just  criticism.  His  delicately  sym- 
pathetic nature  was  a  peculiar  qualification  for  appreciating  the 
works  of  others.  This  also  gave  him  his  singular  power  of  reading 
character.  His  drawing  of  the  members  of  the  Literary  Club,  in 
the  poem  "  Retaliation,"  is  a  supreme  work  of  art.  On  the  strength 
of  Garrick's  well-known  epigram — 

"Here  lies  poet  Goldsmith,  for  shortness  called  Noll, 
Who  wrote  like  an  angel,  but  talked  like  poor  Poll " — 

it  has  sometimes  been  said  that  he  was  very  dull  in  conversation, 
and  that  in  the  Literary  Club  he  was  often  made  a  butt  As 
Boswell  admits,  his  conversational  dulness  has  been  much  exag- 
gerated. Undoubtedly  he  was  quicker  with  his  pen  than  with  his 
tongue.  A  man  of  fine  taste  needs  time  to  mature  his  thoughts  ; 
and  Goldsmith,  careless  of  his  reputation,  often  opened  his  mouth 
without  the  least  premeditation.  As  to  his  being  made  a  butt,  it 
was  part  of  his  peculiar  humour  to  sacrifice  himself  for  the  amuse- 
ment of  the  company  by  affecting  ridiculous  vanity  and  stupidity. 
Many  of  the  anecdotes  of  his  vanity  bear  evidence  of  the  stolidity 
of  the  narrators — their  incapability  of  understanding  a  joke  or 
entering  into  the  fun  of  humorous  affectation. 

In  the  matter  of  emotion,  he  was  one  of  those  beings  that  are 
often  found  in  extremes.  When  fortune  went  well  with  him,  he 
was  as  happy  as  the  day  was  long.  So  mobile  were  his  sympa- 
thies that  he  could  not  be  sad  in  merry  company,  and  was  easily 
beguiled  out  of  his  sorrows.  Yet  he  was  also  easily  dispirited,  and 
often  took  dark  views  of  the  future.  Self-respect  kept  him  from 
making  many  confidants  of  his  heartless  anticipations.  He  often 
assumed  an  appearance  of  gaiety  when  there  was  no  small  anxiety 


464  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

within  ;  but  we  find  him,  in  an  affectionate  letter  to  his  brother  in 
Ireland,  complaining  of  a  "  settled  melancholy"  and  "gloomy 
haliits  of  thinking";  and  he  sometimes  laid  his  cares  before  Lia 
sturdy  friend  Johnson.  After  a  happy  deliverance  from  gloomy 
apprehensions,  he  would  entertain  his  friends  with  ludicrous  pic- 
tures of  his  previous  distress.  He  was  a  warm  friend  and  a 
generous  enemy;  quick  to  take  offence  and  easily  pacified.  Hi.s 
lieart  overflowed  with  tenderness :  he  loved  the  happy  faces  uf 
children,  and  could  not  bear  to  see  misery.  With  his  rare  skill  in 
divining  the  thoughts  of  others,  and  detecting  what  they  prided 
themselves  upon,  he  might  have  been  a  stinging  satirist ;  but  his 
tenderness,  though  it  could  not  restrain,  always  induced  him  to 
soften  the  dart. 

The  imprudence  of  his  conduct  has  often  been  dilated  upon. 
As  a  young  man  he  was  flighty,  and  more  bent  upon  seeing  the 
world  than  willing  to  subside  into  a  staid  professional  career.  His 
life  was  one  long  battle  with  imprudence.  He  was  thirty-one 
when  he  finally  settled  down  to  authorship ;  and  then  he  never 
thought  of  laying  up  money  for  an  evil  day,  but  spent  faster  than 
he  earned,  and  died  two  thousand  pounds  in  debt.  "  His  purse 
replenished,"  says  Judge  Day,  "the  season  of  relaxation  and 
pleasure  took  its  turn,  in  attending  the  theatres,  Ranelagh,  Vaux- 
hall,  and  other  scenes  of  gaiety  and  amusement.  When  his  funds 
were  dissipated — and  they  fled  more  rapidly  from  his  being  the 
dupe  of  many  artful  persons,  male  and  female,  who  practised  upon 
his  benevolence — he  returned  to  his  literary  labours,  and  shut  him- 
self up  from  society  to  provide  fresh  matter  for  his  bookseller,  and 
fresh  supplies  for  himself."  There  are  several  well-known  anec- 
dotes of  his  imprudent  generosity.  On  one  occasion  about  the 
beginning  of  his  career  as  an  author,  he  pawned  a  suit  of  clothes 
that  he  had  on  loan  to  save  his  landlady  from  an  execution  for 
debt  Throughout  all  his  struggles  he  continued  to  send  money 
to  his  poor  mother  in  Ireland ;  and  when  he  died,  "  on  the  stairs 
of  his  apartment  there  was  the  lamentation  of  the  old  and  infirm, 
and  the  sobbing  of  women,  poor  objects  of  his  charity,  to  whom 
he  had  never  turned  a  deaf  ear." 

Opinions. — Goldsmith  is  not  known  to  have  held  strong  opinions, 
as  Johnson  did,  either  in  politics  or  in  sectarian  religion.  He  was 
more  of  an  observer  than  of  a  doctrinaire.  He  had  seen  much  of 
mankind,  and  interested  himself  more  in  noting  characteristic  ex- 
pression and  conduct  than  in  gaining  adherents  to  any  favourite 
views.  The  point  of  view  of  the  Chinese  Letters  is  characteristic. 
Himself  emancipated  by  temperament  and  education  from  nearly 
every  mode  of  traditionary  prejudice,  he  regarded  as  absurd  and 
mischievous  many  of  the  English  opinions,  customs,  and  iustitu- 


OLIVER   GOLDSMITH.  465 

tions.  But  he  did  not  attack  these  directly,  as  Mr  Matthew  Ar- 
nold has  lately  done,  in  his  own  proper  person.  He  assumed  the 
person  of  a  philosophic  Chinaman,  and  showed,  in  the  form  of  let- 
ters to  friends  in  the  East,  how  English  ways  appeared  in  the  eyes 
of  a  "Citizen  of  the  World,"  In  these  letters  he  not  only  expresses 
surprise  at  superficial  absurdities  in  dress,  in  public  ceremonies, 
and  suchlike,  and  at  such  incongruities  as  charging  admission-tees 
to  tombs  and  other  memorials  of  great  men,  but  also  strikes  at 
graver  subjects,  at  the  law  of  divorce,  at  iniquities  in  the  ad- 
ministration of  justice,  at  the  abuses  of  Church  patronage,  at  the 
frivolous  causes  of  great  wars,  and  similar  matters  of  more  serious 
import. 

ELEMENTS  OF  STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — The  best  evidence  of  Goldsmith's  wide  command 
of  language  is  his  excellence  in  so  many  different  kinds  of  compo- 
sition. The  remarkable  thing  is  his  combination  of  purity  with 
copiousness.  He  is  more  copious  than  Addison  ;  and,  while  no  less 
simple  than  that  master  of  simple  language,  he  never  is  affectedly 
easy,  never  condescends  to  polite  slang.  One  is  safe  to  assert  that 
no  writer  of  English  is  at  once  so  copious  and  so  pure. 

Sentences  and  Paragraphs. — The  light  and  graceful  structure  of 
Goldsmith's  sentences  cannot  be  too  much  admired.  It  would  be 
interesting  to  find  out  what  preceding  writer  he  is  most  indebted 
to.  We  may  concede  to  Boswell  and  to  Dr  Nathan  Drake  that  in 
some  respects  he  belongs  to  the  "Johnsonian  school."  Had  Gold- 
smith written  before  Johnson,  he  would  probably  have  constructed 
his  sentences  as  loosely  as  Addison.  He  may  have  learnt  from 
Johnson  to  observe  grammar  more  strictly  than  was  usual  with  the 
Queen  Anne  writers,  to  balance  clauses,  and  to  round  off  his  sen- 
tences without  leaving  inelegant  tags.  Probably  he  caught  these 
parts  of  his  skill  from  Johnson,  though  none  but  the  greater  gram- 
matical accuracy  can  be  said  to  have  been  originated  by  "  the  great 
lexicographer."  But  in  other  respects  his  style  is  so  unlike  John- 
son's that  it  needs  some  practice  in  criticism  to  discover  any  re- 
semblance whatsoever.  Not  to  speak  of  Goldsmith's  simple  diction 
and  exquisite  melody,  which  make  a  sufficient  disguise  for  the 
general  reader,  his  sentences  are  much  shorter,  less  condensed,  and 
less  abrupt  When  we  remember  Goldsmith's  acquaintance  with 
French  literature,  we  can  hardly  help  ascribing  some  of  the  merits 
of  his  style  to  the  influence  of  the  French. 

In  the  following  specimens  of  his  style,  taken  from  his  earliest 
work,  the  '  Inquiry  into  the  Present  State  of  Polite  Learning,'  we 
catch  an  occasional  echo  of  Johnson ;  but  the  general  structure  is 
much  lighter  and  more  graceful : — 

"if  we  examine  the  state  of  learning  in  Germany,  we  shall  find  that  th«> 

2  Q 


466  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

Germans  early  discovered  a  passion  for  polite  literature ;  but  unl  nppily,  like 
conquerors  who,  invading  the  dominions  of  others,  leave  their  own  to  deso- 
lation, instead  of  studying  the  German  tongue,  they  continued  to  write  in 
Latin.  Thus,  while  they  cultivated  an  obsolete  language,  and  vainly  laboured 
to  apply  it  to  modern  manners,  they  neglected  their  own. 

"  At  the  same  time,  also,  they  began  at  the  wrong  end, — I  mean  by  being 
commentators ;  and  though  they  have  given  many  instances  of  their  indus- 
try, they  have  scarcely  afforded  any  of  genius.  If  criticism  could  have  im- 
proved the  taste  of  a  people,  the  Germans  would  have  been  the  most  polite 
nation  alive.  We  shall  nowhere  behold  the  learned  wear  a  more  important 
appearance  than  here ;  nowhere  more  dignified  with  professorships,  or  dressed 
out  in  the  fopperies  of  scholastic  finery.  However,  they  seem  to  earn  all  the 
honour  of  this  kind  which  they  enjoy.  Their  assiduity  is  unparalleled;  and 
did  they  employ  half  those  hours  on  study  which  they  bestow  on  reading, 
we  might  be  induced  to  pity  as  well  as  praise  their  painful  pre-eminence. 
But,  guilty  of  a  fault  too  common  to  great  readers,  they  write  through  vol- 
umes while  they  do  not  think  through  a  page.  Never  fatigued  themselves, 
they  think  the  reader  can  never  be  weary ;  so  they  drone  on,  saying  all  that 
can  be  said  on  the  subject,  not  selecting  what  may  be  advanced  to  the  pur- 
pose. Were  angels  to  write  books,  they  never  would  write  folios." 

Again — 

"The  French  nobility  have  certainly  a  most  pleasing  way  of  satisfying 
the  vanity  of  an  author,  without  indulging  his  avarice.  A  man  of  literary 
merit  is  sure  of  being  caressed  by  the  great,  though  seldom  enriched.  His 
pension  from  the  Crown  just  supplies  half  a  competence,  and  the  sale  of  his 
labours  makes  some  small  addition  to  his  circumstances.  Thus  the  author 
leads  a  life  of  splendid  poverty,  and  seldom  becomes  wealthy  or  indolent 
enough  to  discontinue  an  exertion  of  those  abilities  by  which  he  rose.  With 
the  English  it  is  different.  Our  writers  of  rising  merit  are  generally  neglected, 
while  the  few  of  an  established  reputation  are  overpaid  by  luxurious  afflu- 
ence. The  young  encounter  every  hardship  which  generally  attends  upon 
aspiring  indigence  ;  the  old  enjoy  the  vulgar  and  perhaps  the  more  prudent 
satisfaction  of  putting  riches  in  competition  with  fame.  Those  are  often 
seen  to  spend  their  youth  in  want  and  obscurity ;  these  are  sometimes  found 
to  lead  an  old  age  of  indolence  and  avarice.  But  such  treatment  must  natu- 
rally be  expected  from  Englishmen,  whose  national  character  is  to  be  slow 
and  cautious  in  making  friends,  but  violent  in  friendships  once  contracted," 

Once  more,  in  a  criticism  of  Gray's  Odes,  he  says — 

"We  cannot  without  regret  behold  talents  so  capable  of  giving  pleasure 
to  all,  exerted  in  efforts  that  at  best  can  amuse  only  the  few :  we  cannot 
behold  this  rising  poet  seeking  fame  among  the  learned,  without  hinting  to 
him  the  advice  that  Isocrates  used  to  give  his  scholars,  Study  the  people. 
This  study  it  is  that  has  conducted  the  great  masters  of  antiquity  up  to 
immortality.  Pindar  himself,  of  whom  our  modern  lyrist  is  an  imitator, 
appears  entirely  guided  by  it.  He  adapted  his  works  exactly  to  the  disposi- 
tions of  his  countrymen.  Irregular,  enthusiastic,  and  quick  in  transition, 
he  wrote  for  a  people  inconstant,  of  warm  imagination,  and  exquisite  sensi- 
bility. He  chose  the  most  popular  subjects,  and  all  his  allusions  are  to  cus- 
toms well  known  in  his  days  to  the  meanest  person." 

Figures  of  Speech. — Goldsmith  resembles  Johnson  in  the  neglect 
of  ornamental  similitudes.  To  say  so  is,  however,  to  use  "  simili- 
tudes" in  the  sense  of  similes,  or  formal  similitudes.  The  remark 


OLIVER  GOLDSMITH.  467 

does  not  apply  as  regards  metaphors.  Goldsmith's  style  is  too 
much  elevated  by  metaphors  to  be  called  plain.  He  is  not  so  plain 
a  writer  as  Addison ;  his  style  has  (to  use  Ben  Jonson's  expression) 
more  "blood  and  juice."  Thus — 

"  The  other  countries  of  Europe  may  be  considered  as  immersed  in  ignor- 
ance or  making  but  feeble  efforts  to  rise.  Spain  has  long  fallen  from  amaz- 
ing Europe  with  her  wit?  to  amusing  them  with  the  greatness  of  her  catholic 
credulity." 

Again — 

"  Men  like  these,  united  by  one  bond,  pursuing  one  design,  spend  their 
labour  and  their  lives  in  making  their  fellow-creatures  happy,  and  in  repair- 
ing the  breaches  caused  by  ambition.  In  this  light,  the  meanest  philosopher, 
though  all  his  possessions  are  his  lamp  or  his  cell,  is  more  truly  valuable  than 
he  whose  name  echoes  to  the  shout  of  the  million,  and  who  stands  in  all  the 
glare  of  admiration.  In  this  light,  though  poverty  and  contemptuous  neglect 
are  all  the  wages  of  his  goodwill  from  mankind,  yet  the  rectitude  of  his  in- 
tention is  an  ample  recompense  ;  and  self-applause  for  the  present,  and  the 
alluring  prospect  of  fame  for  futurity,  reward  his  labours.  The  perspective 
of  life  brightens  upon  us,  when  terminated  by  an  object  so  charming.  Every 
intermediate  image  of  want,  banishment,  or  sorrow,  receives  a  lustre  from 
its  distant  influence.  With  this  in  view,  the  patriot,  philosopher,  and  poet, 
have  often  looked  with  calmness  on  disgrace  and  famine,  and  rested  on  their 
straw  with  cheerful  serenity.  Even  the  last  terrors  of  departing  nature  abate 
of  their  severity,  and  look  kindly  on  him  who  considers  his  sufferings  as  a 
passport  to  immortality,  and  lays  his  sorrows  on  the  bed  of  fame." 

Contrast. — As  sufficiently  appears  in  the  preceding  quotations,  he 
was  taken  with  the  charm  of  rhetorical  antithesis,  and  laboured  to 
deliver  his  sayings  in  an  antithetical  form.  In  his  '  Polite  Learn- 
ing '  we  can  read  but  few  sentences  without  encountering  a  formal 
"  point " ;  and  here  and  there  we  find  the  general  sparkle  condensed 
into  the  brilliancy  of  an  epigram. 

The  following  are  examples  of  his  epigrams  :— 

'  Cautious  stupidity  is  always  in  the  right." 

'  We  see  more  of  the  world  by  travel,  more  of  human  nature  by  remain* 

ing  at  home." 

'  We  grow  learned,  not  wise,  by  too  long  a  continuance  at  college." 

4  To  imitate  nature  was  found  to  be  the  surest  way  of  imitating  antiquity." 

'  The  true  use  of  speech  is  not  so  much  to  express  our  wants  as  to  conceal 

them. "  l 

The  peculiar  artifice  of  ending  off  a  sentence  with  an  unexpected 
turn  is  of  the  nature  of  epigram.  Of  this  artifice  we  might  cull 
numerous  examples  from  Goldsmith.  It  peculiarly  suited  his  gay 
volatility.  We  take  the  three  following  from  the  narrative  of  the 
Man  in  Black  : 2 

1  Epigrams  similar  to  this  occur  in  South,  Butler,  Young,  and  Voltaire. 

a  Tli.-  Man  in  Black  is  usually  said  to  be  modelled  on  the  real  character  of 
Goldsmith's  father.  The  father  of  the  Man  in  Black  is  obviously  drawn  from 
Goldsmith's  father;  the  Man  in  Black  is  no  less  obviously  intended  by  Gold- 
smith tor  a  portrait  of  himself. 


468  FROM    1760  TO   1790. 

"After  I  had  resided  at  college  for  seven  years,  my  father  died,  and  left 
me — his  blessing." 

"  0  Friendship  !  thou  fond  soother  of  the  human  breast,  to  thee  we  fly  in 
every  calamity ;  to  thee  the  wretched  seek  for  succour ;  on  thee  the  care-tired 
son  of  misery  fondly  relies  ;  from  thy  kind  assistance  the  unfortunate  always 
hopes  for  relief,  and  may  ever  be  sure  of — disappointment ! " 

"A  soldier  does  not  exult  more  when  he  counts  over  the  wounds  he  has 
received,  than  a  female  veteran  when  she  relates  the  wounds  she  has  formerly 
given  :  exhaustless  when  she  begins  a  narrative  of  the  former  death-dealing 
power  of  her  eyes.  She  tells  of  the  knight  in  gold  lace,  who  died  with  a 
single  frown,  and  never  rose  again  till — he  was  married  to  his  maid  ;  of  the 
squire  who,  being  cruelly  denied,  in  a  rage  flew  to  the  window,  and  lifting 
up  the  sash,  threw  himself  in  an  agony — into  his  arm-chair ;  of  the  parson 
who,  crossed  in  love,  resolutely  swallowed  opium,  which  banished  the  stings 
of  despised  love — by  making  him  sleep." 

Minor  Figures. — Goldsmith  sometimes  assumes  a  declamatory 
style,  with  oratorical  interrogation  and  answer,  and  paragraphs  in 
the  form  of  a  climax.  In  these  declamations  there  is  usually  a 
tincture  of  mock-heroism.  Thus — 

"What,  then,  are  the  proper  encouragements  of  genius?  I  answer,  Sub- 
sistence and  respect ;  for  these  are  rewards  congenial  to  its  nature.  Every 
animal  has  an  aliment  suited  to  its  constitution.  The  heavy  ox  seeks 
nourishment  from  earth  ;  the  light  chameleon  has  been  supposed  to  exist  on 
air  ;  a  sparer  diet  than  even  this  will  satisfy  the  man  of  true  genius,  for  he 
makes  a  luxurious  banquet  upon  empty  applause.  It  is  this  alone  which 
has  inspired  all  that  ever  was  truly  great  and  noble  among  us.  It  is,  as 
Cicero  tinely  calls  it,  the  echo  of  virtue.  Avarice  is  the  passion  of  inferior 
natures  ;  money  the  pay  of  the  common  herd.  The  author  who  draws  his 
quill  merely  to  take  a  purse,  no  more  deserves  success  than  he  who  presents 
a  pistoL" 

QUALITIES  OF  STYLE, 

Simplicity. — The  specimens  already  quoted  afford  a  fair  measure 
of  his  simple  language  and  simple  structure  Goldsmith  is  among 
the  simplest  of  our  writers.  In  one  aspect  he  differs  from  Addi- 
son :  his  diction  is  more  metaphorical,  farther  elevated  above  the 
language  of  common  life.  This  is  borne  out  by  our  quotations. 
But  in  another  and  more  striking  aspect  he  resembles  Addison : 
his  simplicity  is  an  elegant  simplicity.  He  is  not  homely  like 
Paley,  nor  coarse  like  Swift.  This,  also,  is  sufficiently  apparent 
without  farther  illustration. 

To  write  with  simplicity  on  some  of  Goldsmith's  themes  was 
comparatively  easy.  '  Others  could  not  have  been  treated  in  a 
simple  style  without  a  considerable  effort.  In  particular,  some 
of  his  '  Animated  Nature '  must  have  tried  his  powers  of  simple 
exposition.  Where  he  had  objects  to  describe — birds,  beasts,  or 
fishes— he  probably  experienced  no  difficulty  except  in  mastering 
the  details.  But  sometimes  he  is  called  upon  to  expound  general 


OLIVER   GOLDSMITH.  469 

principles,  and  then  we  have  an  opportunity  of  seeing  the  extent 
of  his  art.  The  following  is  his  account  of  the  attraction  of 
gravity.  In  some  parts  the  language  might  possibly  be  made 
more  familiar  without  becoming  less  exact;  but  his  manner  of 
approaching  the  subject,  and  the  easy  sequence  of  the  thoughts, 
are  eminently  popular.  He  seems  at  the  end  of  every  sentence 
to  place  himself  in  the  position  of  the  reader — to  weigh  its  effect 
from  the  reader's  point  of  view,  to  study  what  might  be  expected 
next,  and  how  to  carry  the  reader  easily  forward  to  the  next 
idea : — 

"  Modern  philosophy  has  taught  us  to  believe,  that  when  the  great 
Author  of  nature  began  the  work  of  creation,  he  chose  to  operate  by  second 
causes  ;  and  that,  suspending  the  constant  exertion  of  his  power,  he  endued 
matter  with  a  quality  by  which  the  universal  economy  of  nature  might  be 
continued,  without  his  immediate  assistance.  This  quality  is  called  attrac- 
tion, a  sort  of  approximating  influence,  which  all  bodies,  whether  terrestrial 
or  celestial,  are  found  to  possess  ;  and  which,  in  all,  increases  as  the  quantity 
of  matter  in  each  increases.  The  sun,  by  far  the  greatest  body  in  our  system, 
is,  of  consequence,  possessed  of  much  the  greatest  share  of  this  attracting 
power  ;  and  all  the  planets,  of  which  our  earth  is  one,  are  of  course  entirely 
subject  to  its  superior  influence.  Were  this  power,  therefore,  left  uncon- 
trolled by  any  other,  the  sun  must  quickly  have  attracted  all  the  bodies  of 
our  celestial  system  to  itself  ;  but  it  is  equally  counteracted  by  another 
power  of  equal  efficacy  ;  namely,  a  progressive  force  which  each  planet  re- 
ceived when  it  was  impelled  forward  by  the  divine  Architect  upon  its  first 
formation.  The  heavenly  bodies  of  our  system  being  thus  acted  upon  by 
two  opposing  powers — namely,  by  that  of  attraction,  which  draws  them  to- 
wards the  sun,  and  that  of  impulsion,  which  drives  them  straight  forward 
into  the  great  void  of  space — they  pursue  a  track  between  these  contrary 
directions ;  and  each,  like  a  stone  whirled  about  in  a  sling,  obeying  two 
opposite  forces,  circulates  round  its  great  centre  of  heat  and  motion." 

Clearness. — As  we  have  frequently  noticed  in  treating  of  simple 
writers,  it  is  vain  to  expect  in  union  with  simplicity  the  somewhat 
antagonistic  merit  of  precision.  Goldsmith  is  no  exception :  he  is 
not  careful  to  observe  mathematical  accuracy.  Thus,  in  the  above 
passage,  a  mathematician  would  object  to  the  phrase,  "  equally 
counteracted  by  another  power  of  equal  efficacy,"  as  an  expression 
for  tlie  action  of  centrifugal  relatively  to  centripetal  force.  In 
exact  language,  it  would  rather  apply  to  two  equal  forces  acting 
in  direct  opposition,  and  so  bringing  things  to  a  stand-still 

Strength. — Had  the  bent  of  Goldsmith's  genius  been  for  the 
sublime,  the  works  that  he  undertook  gave  him  ample  oppor- 
tunities of  displaying  his  powers.  His  periodical  essays,  as  their 
purpose  demanded,  were  chiefly  upon  the  lighter  topics.  But  in 
his  '  History  of  the  Earth  and  of  Animated  Nature'  (to  quote  the 
title  at  full  length),  he  was  free  to  describe  the  grandeurs  of 
nature  as  well  as  the  beauties  and  the  curiosities ;  and  he  pre- 
ferred the  beautiful,  the  odd,  and  the  instructive  to  the  sublime. 


470  FEOM   1760  TO   1790. 

So  in  his  histories  there  was  plenty  of  room  for  lofty  declamation; 
but  he  shows  no  inclination  to  avail  himself  of  such  opportunities. 
Let  us  take,  for  instance,  his  reflections  on  the  death  of  Caesar, 
and  on  the  extinction  of  the  Western  Empire  of  Rome — both  good 
openings  for  the  eloquent  worshipper  of  greatness.  The  following 
is  his  peroration  on  Caesar,  more  remarkable  for  sound  judgment 
than  for  eloquence  : — 

"  Caesar  was  killed  in  the  fifty-sixth  year  of  his  age,  and  about  fourteen 
years  after  he  began  the  conquest  of  the  world.  If  we  examine  his  history, 
we  shall  be  equally  at  a  loss  whether  most  to  admire  his  great  abilities  or 
his  wonderful  fortune.  To  pretend  to  say  that  from  the  beginning  he 
planned  the  subjection  of  his  native  country,  is  doing  no  great  credit  to  his 
well-known  penetration,  as  a  thousand  obstacles  lay  in  his  way,  which 
fortune,  rather  than  conduct,  was  to  surmount.  No  man,  therefore,  of  his 
sagacity,  would  have  begun  a  scheme  in  which  the  chances  of  succeeding 
were  so  many  against  him  :  it  is  most  probable  that,  like  all  very  successful 
men,  he  only  made  the  best  of  every  occurrence ;  and  his  ambition  rising 
with  his  good  fortune,  from  at  first  being  contented  with  humbler  aims,  he 
at  lust  begun  to  tliink  of  governing  the  world,  when  he  found  scarce  any  ob- 
stacle to  oppose  his  designs.  Such  is  the  disposition  of  man,  whose  cravings 
after  power  are  always  most  insatiable  when  he  enjoys  the  greatest  share." 

He  dismisses  the  Roman  Empire  at  the  conclusion  of  his 
*  History  of  Rome '  with  two  sentences  : — 

"Such  was  the  end  of  this  great  empire,  that  had  conquered  mankind 
with  its  arms,  and  instructed  the  world  with  its  wisdom  ;  that  had  risen  by 
.temperance,  and  that  fell  by  luxury  ;  that  had  been  established  by  a  spirit 
of  patriotism,  and  that  sunk  into  ruin  when  the  empire  was  become  so  ex- 
tensive, that  a  Roman  citizen  was  but  an  empty  name.  Its  final  dissolution 
happened  about  five  hundred  and  twenty-two  years  after  the  battle  of  Phar- 
salia  ;  an  hundred  and,,  forty-six  after  the  removal  of  the  imperial  seat  to 
Constantinople  •  ami  four  hundred  and  seventy-six  after  the  nativity  of  our 
Saviour. " 

Bolingbroke,  Burke,  or  De  Quincey  would  have  concluded  in  a 
much  loftier  strain. 

Pathos. — Considering  Goldsmith's  natural  tenderness  and  wide 
acquaintance  with  distress,  one  would  expect  his  writings  to  be 
deeply  tinged  with  pathos.  In  reality,  however,  he  is  not  so 
pathetic  a  writer  as  Sterne.  His  benevolence  was  probably  more 
active  than  sentimental,  just  as  Sterne's  was  more  sentimental 
than  active.  His  poems  and  his  novel  contain  some  of  our  very 
finest  touches  of  pathos,  but  in  his  ordinary  prose  we  meet  with 
comparatively  few.  The  only  deeply  touching  letter  in  his 
'  Citizen  of  the  World '  is  one  entitled  "  A  City  Night  Piece," 
and  it  in  some  parts  is  too  distressing  to  be  lingered  over  with 
melancholy  pleasure,  rather  serving  the  moralist's  end  of  making 
the  reader  uncomfortable  : — 

"The  clock  just  struck  two,  the  expiring  taper  rises  and  sinks  in  the 
socket,  the  watchman  forgets  the  hour  iu  slumber,  the  laborious  and  the 


OLIVER  GOLDSMITH.  471 

happy  are  at  rest,  and  nothing  wakes  but  meditation,  guilt,  revelry,  ami 
despair.  The  drunkard  once  more  fills  the  destroying  bowl,  the  robber 
walks  his  midnight  round,  and  the  suicide  lifts  his  guilty  arm  against  his 
own  sacred  person. 

"Let  me  no  longer  waste  the  night  over  the  pages  of  antiquity  or  the 
sallies  of  contemporary  genius,  but  pursue  the  solitary  walk,  where  Vanity 
ever  changing,  but  a  few  hours  past  walked  before  me,  where  she  kept  up 
the  pageant,  and  now  like  a  froward  child,  seems  hushed  with  her  own 
importunities.  .  .  . 

"  How  few  appear  in  those  streets  which  but  some  few  hours  ngo  were 
crowded  1  and  those  who  appear  now  no  longer  wear  their  daily  mask,  nor 
attempt  to  hide  their  lewdness  or  their  misery. 

"But  who  are  those  who  make  the  streets  their  couch,  and  find  a  short 
repose  from  wretchedness  at  the  doors  of  the  opulent  ?  These  are  strangers, 
wanderers,  and  orphans,  whose  circumstances  are  too  humble  to  expect  re- 
dress, and  whose  distresses  are  too  great  even  for  pity.  Their  wretchedness 
excites  rather  horror  than  pity.  Some  are  without  the  covering  even  of 
rags,  and  others  emaciated  with  disease :  the  world  has  disclaimed  them ; 
society  turns  its  back  upon  their  distress,  and  has  given  them  up  to  naked- 
ness and  hunger.  .  .  . 

"Why  was  I  born  a  man,  and  yet  see  the  sufferings  of  wretches  I  cannot 
relieve  !  Poor  houseless  creatures !  the  world  will  give  you  reproaches,  but 
will  not  give  you  relief.  The  slightest  misfortunes  of  the  great,  the  most 
imaginary  uneasiness  of  the  rich,  are  aggravated  with  all  the  power  of  elo- 
quence, and  held  up  to  engage  our  attention  and  sympathetic  sorrow.  The 
poor  weep  unheeded,  persecuted  by  every  subordinate  species  of  tyranny; 
and  every  law  which  gives  others  security,  becomes  an  enemy  to  them. 

"Why  was  this  heart  of  mine  framed  with  so  much  sensibility  ?  or  why 
was  not  my  fortune  adapted  to  its  impulse?  Tenderness,  without  a  capacity 
of  relieving,  only  makes  the  man  who  feels  it  more  wretched  than  the  object 
which  sues  for  assistance." 

The  Ludicrous. — Goldsmith  surpasses  all  our  humourists  in  the 
combination  of  delicate  wit  with  extravagant  fun.  His  fancy  was 
of  the  lightest  and  airiest  order,  and  his  volatile  spirit  was  easily 
warmed  to  the  boiling-point  of  comical  extravagance.  "  His 
comic  writing,"  says  Leigh  Hunt,  "  is  of  the  class  which  is  per- 
haps as  much  preferred  to  that  of  a  staider  sort  by  people  in 
general,  as  it  is  by  the  writer  of  these  pages — comedy  running 
into  farce.  ...  It  is  that  of  the  prince  of  comic  writers, 
Moliere.  The  English  have  no  dramatists  to  compare  in  this 
respect  with  the  Irish.  Farquhar,  Goldsmith,  and  Sheridan  sur- 
pass them  all ;  and  O'Keefe,  as  a  farce-writer,  stands  alone." 

The  following  passage  from  a  letter  written  about  the  time  when 
he  commenced  author,  may  be  quoted  as  characteristic.  He  was 
far  from  being  a  happy  self-complacent  man,  but  the  mere  excite- 
ment of  writing  to  a  friend  was  enough  to  elevate  him  "  o'er  a' 
the  ills  o'  life  victorious."  The  sturdier,  less  inflammable  spirit  of 
Burns,  required  stronger  stimulants  to  raise  it  to  the  same  pitch  : — 

"God's  curse,  sir  !  who  am  I  ?  Eh  !  what  am  I?  Do  you  know  whom 
you  have  otlended I  A  inaii  whose  character  may  one  of  these  days  be  men- 


472  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

tioned  with  profound  respect  in  a  German  comment  or  Dutch  Dictionary; 
whose  name  you  will  probably  hear  ushered  in  by  a  Doctissimus  Doctissi- 
morum,  or  heel-pieced  with  a  long  Latin  termination.  Think  how  Gold- 
Bmhhius,  or  Gubblegurchius,  or  some  such  sound,  as  rough  as  a  nutmeg- 
grater,  will  become  me.  ...  I  must  own  my  ill-natured  contemporaries 
have  not  hitherto  paid  me  those  honours  I  have  had  such  just  reason  to 
expect.  I  have  not  yet  seen  my  face  reflected  in  all  tho  lively  display  of 
red  and  white  paints  on  any  sign-posts  in  the  suburbs.  Your  handkerchief- 
weavers  seem  as  yet  unacquainted  with  my  merits  or  my  physiognomy,  and 
the  very  snuff-box  makers  appear  to  have  forgot  their  respect.  Tell  them 
all  from  me,  they  are  a  spt  of  Gothic,  barbarous,  ignorant  scoundrels.  There 
will  come  a  day,  no  doubt  it  will,"  &c. 

His  works  contain  many  traces  of  this  airy  conquest  of  the  ills 
of  life.  Beau  Tibbs  is  made  to  describe  his  garret  as  "  the  first 
floor  down  the  chimney "  ;  the  Man  in  Black,  when  imprisoned, 
reflects  that  "  he  is  now  on  one  side  the  door,  and  those  who  are 
unconfined  are  on  the  other;  that  is  all  the  difference  between 
them:"  and  both  are  strokes  of  wit  that  may  have  consoled  the 
author  himself  in  similar  circumstances.  His  incomparable  "  de- 
scription of  an  author's  bed-chamber,"  ending  with  the  couplet — 

"  A  night-cap  decked  his  brows  instead  of  bay, 
A  cap  by  night — a  stocking  all  the  day  " — 

may  also  be  taken  as  a  Immorous  transfiguration  of  his  own  expe- 
rienca  Take  also  the  following  anecdote  related  in  the  "  Club  of 
Authors  "  : — 

"  I'll  tell  you  a  story,  gentlemen,  which  is  as  true  as  that  this  pipe  is 
made  of  clay.  When  I  was  delivered  of  my  first  book,  I  owed  my  tailor  for 
a  suit  of  clothes ;  but  that  is  nothing  new,  you  know,  and  may  be  any  man's 
case  as  well  as  mine.  Well,  owing  him  for  a  suit  of  clothes,  and  hearing 
that  my  book  took  very  well,  he  sent  for  his  money,  and  insisted  on  being 
paid  immediately.  Though  I  was  at  the  time  rich  in  fame,  for  my  book  ran 
like  wild-fire,  yet  I  was  very  short  in  money,  and  being  unable  to  satisfy  his 
demand,  prudently  resolved  to  keep  my  chamber,  preferring  a  prison  of  my 
own  choosing  at  home,  to  one  of  my  tailor's  choosing  abroad.  In  vain  the 
bailiffs  used  all  their  arts  to  decoy  me  from  my  citadel ;  in  vain  they  sent  to 
let  me  know  that  a  gentleman  wanted  to  speak  with  me  at  the  next  tavern; 
in  vain  they  came  with  an  urgent  message  from  my  aunt  in  the  country;  in 
vain  I  was  told  that  a  particular  Mend  was  at  the  point  of  death,  and  de- 
sired to  take  his  last  farewell.  I  was  deaf,  insensible,  rock,  adamant;  the 
bailiffs  could  make  no  impression  on  my  hard  heart,  for  I  effectually  kept 
my  liberty  by  never  stirring  out  of  my  room. " 

"  This  was  all  very  well  for  a  fortnight ;  "but  at  the  end  of  that 
time  the  unfortunate  author  was  entrapped  by  "  a  splendid  mes- 
sage from  the  Earl  of  Doomsday."  He  took  coach  and  rode  in 
high  expectation  to  the  residence,  as  he  thought,  of  his  noble  pa- 
tron ;  but  on  alighting,  found  himself,  to  his  horror,  at  the  door  of 
a  spunging-house.  All  the  proceedings  of  this  club  of  authors  are 
in  Goldsmith's  happiest  vein,  and  form  a  good  illustration  of  his 


THEOLOGY.  473 

power  of  throwing  a  ludicrous  colour  over  incidents  uncomfortably 
near  the  reality  of  his  own  life. 

Goldsmith  is  also  the  most  amiable  of  our  satirists.  He  was  full 
of  "  the  milk  of  human  kindness,"  and  the  range  of  his  sympathies 
was  wide.  His  ridicule  is  always  on  the  side  of  good  sense  and 
good  feeling.  And  he  handles  even  his  embodiments  of  folly  and 
weakness  "  tenderly,  as  if  he  loved  them  "  ;  as  if ,  at  least,  he  had 
a  lurking  toleration  for  tliem,  and  secretly  recognised  their  claim 
to  exist  in  their  own  way  as  varieties  of  multiform  humanity. 

The  most  exquisite  of  his  humorous  creations  is  Beau  Tibba, 
who  figures  in  the  letters  of  the  '  Citizen  of  the  World* 


OTHER    WRITERa 
THEOLOGY. 

Few  of  the  theologians  that  we  reckon  in  this  period  were  men 
of  high  literary  celebrity.  The  reason  probably  is  that  there  was 
no  exciting  topic  to  vex  the  theological  world,  and  put  its  foremost 
intellects  upon  their  mettle.  The  Deists  had  been  a  hundred  times 
answered  before  1760,  and  no  other  heresy  equally  dangerous  and 
exciting  appeared  until  the  ferment  of  the  French  Revolution. 
The  great  religious  revival  begun  by  Wesley  and  Whitefield  gained 
no  distinguished  champions  during  the  first  half  of  the  reign  of 
George  I1L 

One  of  the  most  eminent  divines  of  the  generation  was  Samuel 
Horsley  (1733-1806),  who  has  been  called  "  the  last  of  the  race  of 
polemical  giants  in  the  English  Church — a  learned,  mighty,  fear- 
less, and  haughty  champion  of  the  theology  and  constitution  of  the 
Anglican  Establishment."  His  first  efforts  in  authorship  were  some 
mathematical  tracts.  In  1776  he  published  proposals  for  a  new 
edition  of  the  works  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton.  About  the  same  time 
he  wrote  on  Man's  Free  Agency.  His  charge  to  the  clergy  of  his 
archdeaconry  in  1783  involved  him  in  a  controversy  with  Priestley 
concerning  the  divinity  of  Christ :  in  which  controversy  he  is  said 
to  have  displayed  great  learning,  masterly  reasoning,  and  impetuous 
dogmatism.  He  was  made  Bishop  of  St  David's  in  1788.  When 
the  French  Revolution  broke  out,  he  stood  forth  in  the  front  rank 
of  alarmists,  and  declaimed  with  great  vehemence  against  the  "twin 
furies" — Jacobinism  and  Infidelity.  His  declamations  against 
conventicles,  and  his  disposition  to  favour  penal  laws  against  Dis- 
sent, brought  him  into  collision  with  Robert  Hall,  who  assails  him 
as  "  the  apologist  of  tyranny,  and  the  patron  of  passive  obedience," 
and  describes  a  sermon  of  his  as  a  "  disgusting  picture  of  sancti- 
monious hypocrisy  and  priestly  insolence"  Horsley  had  an  arro- 
gance and  dogmatism  even  fiercer  than  Warburtou's,  without  any- 


474  FROM  1760  TO   1790. 

thing  like  Warburton's  genius  for  style.  His  sermons  procured 
him  respect  from  many  that  disapproved  of  his  violence  as  a  po- 
lemic :  they  are  distinguished  by  breadth  of  view  and  clear  racy 
expression. 

Beilby  Porteous  (1731-1808),  Bishop  of  London,  was  a  divine  of 
a  much  milder  type,  author  of  a  poem  "  On  Death,"  which  gained 
the  Seajtonian  prize  in  1759,  and  the  intimate  associate  of  Hannah 
More,  whom  he  is  said  to  have  assisted  in  the  composition  of  her 
religious  novel,  '  Ccelebs  in  search  of  a  Wife.'  He  wrote  a  life  of 
his  patron,  Archbishop  Seeker,  and  published  a  variety  of  sermons, 
charges,  and  other  devotional  tracts.-  His  '  Evidences '  is  still  used 
as  a  class-book  in  schools. 

The  most  distinguished  Scottish  theologian  of  the  time  was 
George  Campbell,  author  of  an  able  '  Dissertation  on  Miracles,' 
written  in  reply  to  Hume's  Essay  on  Miracles,  and  a  'New  Trans- 
lation of  the  Gospels,  with  Preliminary  Dissertations,'  a  work  dis- 
playing the  highest  critical  sagacity.  We  shall  notice  him  again 
among  the  writers  on  Rhetoric. 

PHILOSOPHY. 

By  far  the  most  eminent  psychologist  of  this  generation  is 
Thomas  Reid  (1710-1796),  the  founder  of  what  is  known  as  the 
Philosophy  of  Common  Sense.  He  was  a  native  of  Kincardine- 
sliire,  and  was  educated  at  Marischal  College,  Aberdeen.  He 
studied  for  the  Church,  and  in  1737  was  presented  to  the  living  of 
New  Machar,  a  parish  near  Aberdeen.  In  1752  he  was  appointed 
Professor  of  Philosophy  in  King's  College,  Aberdeen.  While  in  this 
office  he  took  part  in  the  meetings  of  a  literary  coterie,  of  great 
local  celebrity,  which  comprised  several  men  that  attained  emi- 
nence in  the  world  of  letters — himself,  Campbell,  Beattie,  and  Ger- 
ard. In  1763  he  was  invited  to  succeed  Adam  Smith  as  Professor 
of  Moral  Philosophy  in  Glasgow.  His  '  Inquiry  into  the  Human 
Mind,'  which  had  been  discussed  by  his  friends  in  Aberdeen,  and 
had  been  in  part  submitted  to  Hume,  was  published  in  1764.  The 
impulse  to  this  work  was  given,  as  he  said  in  the  dedication,  by 
Hume's  '  Treatise  of  Human  Nature.'  He  had  not  previously 
"  thought  of  calling  in  question  the  principles  commonly  received 
with  regard  to  the  human  understanding ; "  but  finding  that,  "  by 
reasoning  which  appeared  to  him  to  be  just,"  there  was  built  upon 
those  principles  "  a  system  of  scepticism  which  leaves  no  ground 
to  believe  any  one  thing  rather  than  its  contrary,"  he  proceeded  to 
subject  the  principles  themselves  to  a  close  examination.  "  For 
my  own  satisfaction,  I  entered  into  a  serious  examination  of  the 
principles  upon  which  the  sceptical  system  is  built;  and  was  not  a 
little  surprised  to  find,  that  it  leans  with  its  whole  weight  upon  a 


PHILOSOPHY.  475 

hypothesis  which  is  ancient  indeed,  and  hatli  been  very  generally 
received  by  philosophers,  but  of  which  I  could  find  no  solid  proof. 
The  hypothesis  I  mean  is,  That  nothing  is  perceived  but  what  is 
in  the  mind  which  perceives  it :  that  we  do  not  really  perceive 
things  that  are  external,  but  only  certain  images  and  pictures  of 
them  imprinted  upon  the  mind,  which  are  called  impressions  and 
ideas."  The  '  Inquiry '  has  a  polemical  tone  throughout,  and  con- 
tains a  good  deal  of  humorous  banter  directed  against  Hume  upon 
the  assumption  that  the  arch-sceptic  is  bound  in  consistency  to 
believe  "  neither  his  own  existence  nor  that  of  his  reader,"  and  that 
"  the  intention  of  his  work  is  to  show  that  there  is  neither  human 
nature  nor  science  in  the  world." — Without  attempting  to  define 
Reid's  position  relatively  to  modern  analysts  of  the  mind,  we  may 
give  his  views  concerning  the  origin  of  knowledge  in  his  own  words. 
Against  the  opinion  that  all  knowledge  concerning  external  things 
is  derived  from  the  phenomena  of  Sense  and  the  operations  of  the 
Intellect  upon  the  phenomena,  he  contends  that  "  many  original 
principles  of  belief"  are  "suggested  by  our  sensations."  "Sensa- 
tion suggests  the  notion  of  present  existence,  and  the  belief  that 
what  we  perceive  or  feel  does  now  exist.  ...  A  beginning  of 
existence,  or  any  change  in  nature,  suggests  to  us  the  notion  of  a 
cause,  and  compels  our  belief  of  its  existenca  And,  in  like  man- 
ner, certain  sensations  of  touch,  by  the  constitution  of  our  nature, 
suggest  to  us  extension,  solidity,  and  motion,  which  are  nowise  like 
to  sensations,  although  they  have  been  hitherto  confounded  with 
them." — After  teaching  in  his  Professorship  till  1781,  Reid  pre- 
pared a  more  systematic  exposition  of  the  Mind,  which  appeared 
in  two  parts — 'Essays  on  the  Intellectual  Powers,'  in  1785  ;  and 
'  Essays  on  the  Active  Powers,'  in  1788.  He  continued  his  studious 
activity  till  the  very  close  of  his  long  life,  writing  philosophical 
essays,  working  mathematical  problems,  and  following  the  progress 
of  physical  science. — "In  point  ot  bodily  constitution,  few  men 
have  been  more  indebted  to  nature  than  Dr  Reid.  His  form  was 
vigorous  and  athletic ;  and  his  muscular  force  (though  he  was 
somewhat  under  the  middle  size)  uncommonly  great ;  advantages 
to  which  his  habits  of  temperance  and  exercise,  and  the  unclouded 
serenity  of  his  temper,  did  ample  justice."  The  mere  fact  of  his 
originating  a  school  of  philosophy,  even  though  we  allow  that  his 
conclusions  were  supported  by  popular  feeling,  argues  a  large  meas- 
ure of  intellectual  force,  in  one  direction  or  another ;  but  very  dif- 
ferent opinions  have  been  expressed  as  to  his  capacities  for  mental 
analysis.  Various  particulars  in  his  style  and  in  his  favourite 
studies  indicate  a  tendency  to  dwell  by  preference  upon  the  con- 
crete. He  had  no  great  turn  for  style ;  his  composition  deserves 
the  praise  of  "  ease,  perspicuity,  and  purity  " ;  it  is,  besides,  neat 
and  finished,  and  often  moves  with  considerable  spirit :  but  it  haa 


476  FROM   1760  TO  1790. 

neither  the  Incisive  vigour  of  Campbell,  the  copiousness  of  Smith, 
nor  the  original  freshness  of  Tucker. 

Abraham  Tucker  (1705-1774),  author  of  '  The  Light  of  Nature 
Pursued,  by  Edward  Search,  Esq.' — a  work  in  seven  volumes,  four 
of  which  were  published  in  1765,  and  the  remainder  after  his 
death — is  in  point  of  style  one  of  the  most  pleasing  of  our  philo- 
sophical writers.  The  son  of  a  wealthy  London  merchant,  having 
received  an  Oxford  education  and  acquired  many  elegant  accom- 
plishments, he  bought  an  estate  near  Dorking,  and  there  lived  a 
"  retired  and  undiversified  "  life,  "  the  exercise  of  his  reason  being 
his  daily  employment."  He  declined  the  political  business  that 
Burke  held  to  be  a  duty  intrusted  to  men  of  his  station,  and 
spent  his  time  in  a  soft  Epicurean  endeavour  to  realise  the  maxi- 
mum of  tranquil  happiness.  He  "apportioned  his  time  between 
study  and  relaxation  ; "  and,  when  in  London,  "  commonly  devoted 
much  of  his  evenings  to  the  society  of  his  friends,  relations,  and 
fellow- collegians,  among  whom  he  was  particularly  distinguished 
for  his  dexterity  in  the  Socratic  method  of  disputation."  We  may 
indicate  his  philosophical  position  in  a  loose  compendious  way  by 
saying  that  he  based  his  psychology  upon  Hartley's,  and  that  his 
original  ethical  views  are  adopted,  digested,  and  systematised  in 
Paley's  '  Moral  Philosophy.'  Paley  candidly  acknowledges  his 
obligations.  "  There  is  one  work  to  which  I  owe  so  much,  that  it 
would  be  ungrateful  not  to  confess  the  obligation ;  I  mean  the 
writings  of  the  late  Abraham  Tucker,  Esq.  I  have  found  in  this 
writer  more  original  thinking  and  observation  upon  the  several 
subjects  that  he  has  taken  in  hand,  than  in  any  other,  not  to  say 
in  all  others  put  together.  His  talent  also  for  illustration  is  un- 
rivalled. But  his  thoughts  are  diffused  through  a  long,  various, 
and  irregular  work.  I  shall  account  it  no  mean  praise,  if  I  have 
been  sometimes  able  to  dispose  into  method,  to  collect  into  heads 
and  articles,  or  to  exhibit  in  more  compact  and  tangible  masses, 
what  in  that  otherwise  excellent  performance  is  spread  over  too 
much  surface." — Tucker's  style  has  several  charms  rarely  met  in 
philosophical  works — charms,  indeed,  that  are  more  or  less  incom- 
patible with  rigorous  scientific  precision.  The  diction  is  simple, 
thickly  interspersed  with  colloquial  idioms,  and  has  an  exquisitely 
musical  flow.  In  every  other  sentence  we  are  delighted  with  some 
original  felicity  of  expression  or  of  illustration.  The  loose  and 
often  ungrammatical  structure  of  the  sentences,  and  the  diffusive 
rambling  character  both  of  the  work  as  a  whole  and  of  the  several 
divisions,  forbid  his  being  taken  as  a  model  for  strict  scientific 
exposition ;  but  the  popular  expositor  of  practical  wisdom  might 
learn  a  great  deal  from  his  copious  and  felicitous  language  and 
imagery.  Obviously,  however,  it  will  not  do  even  for  popular 
purposes  to  imitate  him  closely.  The  expense  of  his  voluminous 


PHILOSOPHY.  477 

treatise  may  have  something  to  do  with  the  general  neglect  of  so 
ingenious  a  writer ;  but  at  any  rate  it  is  significant  against  close 
imitation  of  his  style  that  the  views  of  Happiness  and  Virtue  in 
Paley's  'Moral  Philosophy,'  which  are  simply  Tucker's  summarised 
and  formulated,  are  never  referred  to  their  original  author. 

Richard  Price  (1723-1791) — a  Dissenting  minister  in  London, 
who  supported  the  cause  of  American  Independence,  and  who  was 
vehemently  abused  by  Burke  because  from  his  pulpit  in  Old  Jewry 
Lane  he  hailed  the  French  Revolution  as  the  advent  of  Liberty 
— made  himself  a  considerable  name  in  Ethical  Philosophy.  His 
'  Review  of  the  Principal  Questions  and  Difficulties  in  Morals '  was 
published  in  1758.  "He  appears  as  the  antagonist  of  the  empiri- 
cism popularly  associated  with  the  name  of  Locke,  and  as  the 
leading  representative  of  his  time  in  England  of  the  double  origin 
of  knowledge.  The  doctrine  of  Price  with  respect  to  the  Good 
and  the  True  reminds  us  more  of  the  Pure  lleason  of  his  great 
German  contemporary  Kant,  than  of  the  internal  and  common- 
sense  school  of  Hutcheson  and  Reid."  He  also  "  reveals  affinities 
to  Platonism."  l  His  style  displays  in  no  eminent  degree  either 
of  the  cardinal  virtues  of  a  philosophical  work  ;  he  is  not  remark- 
ably perspicuous,  and  he  is  far  from  being  remarkably  precise. 
His  numerous  political  and  economical  pamphlets  are  written  with 
considerable  energy,  "  not  unfitly  typified  by  the  unusual  muscular 
and  nervous  activity  of  his  slender  person." 

Joseph  Priestley  (1733-1804),  a  Unitarian  minister,  illustrious 
in  Natural  Science  as  the  discoverer  of  oxygen  and  other  elementary 
substances,  was  an  irrepressibly  voluminous  writer  not  only  in  science 
but  in  theology,  philosophy,  history,  politics,  and  whatever  hap- 
pened to  engage  his  interest.  At  the  age  of  twenty-two  he  became 
pastor  to  a  Dissenting  congregation,  and  from  that  time  till  1773 
he  occupied  various  situations  as  minister  and  as  tutor,  and  began 
to  make  himself  a  name  by  his  theological  and  scientific  writings. 
From  1773  the  patronage  of  the  Earl  of  Shelburne  enabled  him  to 
devote  the  most  of  his  time  to  scientific  and  literary  pursuits.  He 
made  his  discovery  of  oxygen  in  1774.  In  the  same  year  he  wrote 
a  severe  examination  of  the  Common-Sense  Philosophy,  defending 
the  principles  of  Locke  and  Hartley.  In  his  '  Disquisitions  relat- 
ing to  Matter  and  Spirit,'  1777,  he  avowed  himself  a  materialist, 
and  showed  that  materialism  did  not  affect  the  arguments  for  the 
existence  of  God,  or  for  the  belief  in  a  future  state.  His  '  History 
of  the  Corruptions  of  Christianity,'  1782,  was  attacked,  as  we 
have  said,  by  Horsley,  and  a  hot  war  in  pamphlets  was  carried  on 
through  more  than  one  stage  of  rejoinder  and  surrejoinder.  Dur- 
ing the  excitement  of  the  French  Revolution,  his  advanced  opin- 
ions made  him  an  object  of  aversion ;  his  house  in  Birmingham 
1  Professor  Fraser,  in  the  '  Imperial  Dictionary  of  Biography.' 


478  FROM   1760   TO   1790. 

was  sacked  by  a  mob ;  and  he  was  ultimately  obliged  to  betake 
himself  to  America.  He  died  at  Northumberland  in  Pennsylvania. 
— :He  is  said  to  have  been  a  man  of  mild,  urbane  manners,  and  to 
have  won  the  personal  favour  of  very  bigoted  antagonists  when  he 
met  them  face  to  face.  Brougham  rather  misrepresents  him  in 
describing  him  as  "  a  fierce  and  angry  polemic."  He  often  writes 
severe  things,  but  he  writes  with  perfect  command  of  temper.  He 
cannot  be  charged  with  unprovoked  abuse  :  his  asperities  are  called 
forth  by  what  he  considers  arrogance,  conceit,  or  misrepresentation 
on  the  part  of  others.  "  Those,"  he  says,  "  who  are  disposed  to  be 
civil  to  me  shall  meet  with  civility  from  me  in  return ;  and  as  to 
those  who  are  otherwise  disposed,  I  shall  behave  to  them  as  I  may 
happen  to  be  affected  at  the  time."'  For  his  own  part,  whether 
right  or  wrong,  he  is  exceedingly  fair  and  candid.  His  style  is 
idiomatic,  compact,  incisive,  and  vigorous.  He  is  eminently  easy 
to  follow :  he  usually  describes  the  progress  of  his  thoughts,  ex- 
plains by  what  circumstances  he  was  led  to  take  such  and  such  a 
view,  and  thus  introduces  us  from  the  known  to  the  unknown  by 
an  easy  gradation. 

James  Seattle  (1735-1803),  one  of  Dr  Reid's  Aberdonian  co- 
terie, whose  reputation  rests  chiefly  on  his  poetry,  first  came  before 
the  public  in  1770  as  an  antagonist  to  Hume.  He  was  a  man  of 
intensely  personal,  not  to  say  spiteful  feelings,  intemperately  sen- 
sitive;  and  his  'Essay  on  Truth'  is  written  with  anything  but 
philosophic  calm.  On  the  title-page  he  describes  his  work  as 
"  written  in  opposition  to  sophistry  and  scepticism,"  and  through- 
out ascribes  to  his  opponent  the  basest  motives,  and  to  his  oppon- 
ent's writings  the  most  degrading  influences ;  claims  for  himself 
and  his  side  the  exclusive  possession  of  love  for  truth,  learning, 
mankind,  and  honourable  fairness ;  and  declares  repeatedly  that 
none  of  Mr  Hume's  admirers  understand  him :  in  short,  he  offen- 
sively assumes  a  superiority  to  Hume  in  morals,  and  a  superiority 
to  Hume's  followers  in  intellect.  His  style  has  considerable  power 
of  the  rotund  declamatory  order;  copious,  high-sounding,  and 
elegant ;  occasionally  in  its  appeals  to  established  feeling  throwing 
out  rhetorical  interrogations,  followed  by  brief,  abrupt  answers. 
His  Essay  was  very  popular  with  the  English  clergy,  and  exasper- 
ated the  easy-minded  Hume  more  perhaps  than  any  of  the  numer- 
ous replies  to  his  obnoxious  opinions.  Beattie  wrote  also  in  prose 
several  miscellaneous  essays — 'On  Poetry  and  Music'  (1762); 
'On  Laughter'  (1764);  'On  Classical  Learning'  (1769);  and 
'Dissertations  Moral  and  Critical'  (1783). 

Another  of  the  Aberdonian  coterie,  perhaps  the  most  powerful 
mind  of  the  number,  and  of  a  very  different  temper  from  Beattie, 
was  George  Campbell  (1719-1796),  already  mentioned  as  an  an- 
tagonist to  Hume's  '  Essay  on  Miracles.'  Originally  destined  for 


PHILOSOPHY.,  479 

the  law,  he  changed  his  mind  and  entered  the  Church,  was  ap- 
pointed minister  of  Banchory-Ternan*  wa&  subsequently  translated 
to  one  of  the  city  charges  in  Aberdeen,  and  in  1759  became  Prin- 
cipal of  Marischal  College.  His  first  work  was  the  '  Dissertation 
on  Miracles,'  1762.  After  several  less-known  performances,  lie 
published  in  1776  his  'Philosophy  of  Rhetoric,'  which  is  often 
spoken  of  as  the  most  original  work  on  that  subject  that  had 
appeared  since  Aristotle.  His  '  New  Translation  of  the  Gospels ' 
was  published  in  1778. — Campbell  was  a  man  of  sturdy,  sagacious 
intellect,  and  tolerant  temper.  In  controversy  he  was  candid  and 
generous,  imputing  no  unworthy  motives,  and  making  no  offensive 
claims  to  superior  powers  of  discernment.  His  style  is  perspicuous 
and  terse ;  he  writes  as  one  possessing  a  clear  comprehensive  grasp 
of  his  subject,  and  an  abundant  choice  of  language. 

Along  with  Campbell  may  be  mentioned  Henry  Home,  Lord 
Kames  (1696-1782),  and  Hugh  Blair  (1718-1799) ;  both,  like  him, 
best  known  in  general  literature  by  their  works  on  English  Com- 
position, Home  was  an  Edinburgh  lawyer  of  great  social  wit  and 
literary  tastes,  who  employed  his  leisure  after  his  elevation  to  the 
bench  in  composing  various  works,  metaphysical,  social,  and  criti- 
cal— 'Principles  of  Morality  and  Natural  Religion"  (1751);  'Art 
of  Thinking' (1761);  'Elements  of  Criticism' (1762);  'Sketches  of 
the  History  of  Man'  (1773);  'The  Gentleman  Farmer'  (1777); 
'Loose  Hints  on  Education'  (1781).  His  diction  is  tolerably 
copious,  and  his  turns  of  expression  often  have  something  of  the 
crisp  ingenuity  of  Hume's,  but  his  sentences  are  not  very  skilfully 
put  together  ;  his  style  wants  flow.  Curiously  enough,  his  analysis 
of  the  mechanical  artifices  of  sentence-making  is  one  of  the  most 
substantial  parts  of  his  '  Elements ' ;  it  supplied  both  Campbell 
and  Blair  with  all  that  they  have  to  say  on  sentence-mechanism, 
and  contains  some  ingenuities  that  they  did  not  see  fit  to  adopt. — 
Blair  was  a  highly  popular  minister  in  Edinburgh,  who,  in  1759, 
following  the  example  of  Adam  Smith,  and  also  under  the  patron- 
age of  the  benevolent  Maecenas,  Lord  Kames,  began  to  read  a 
course  of  lectures  on  Belles  Lettres.  A  Chair  of  Rhetoric  being 
endowed  in  1762,  Blair  was  appointed  the  first  Professor.  He 
published  his  course  of  lectures  in  1783.  He  was  the  most  popular 
Bermon-writer  of  his  day.  His  sermons,  the  first  volume  of  which 
was  published  in  1777,  were  received  with  delighted  applause  in 
England ;  were  commended  by  Johnson ;  and  were  translated  into 
almost  every  language  of  Europe.  His  reputation  is  now  consider- 
ably faded :  works  for  which  their  admirers  fondly  predicted  clas- 
sical immortality,  are  now  universally  neglected.  He  was  a  flow- 
ing, elegant  writer,  with  no  great  pretensions  to  depth  or  origin- 
ality: his 'Rhetoric'* is  a  very  vapid  performance  compared  with 
Campbell's — "  Campbell's,"  says  Whately,  "  is  incomparably  supe- 


480  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

rior,  not  only  in  depth  of  thought  and  ingenious  original  research, 
but  also  in  practical  utility  to  the  student" 

Adam  Smith  (1723-1790)  is  an  important  figure  in  the  history 
of  Ethics,  and,  as  the  author  of  the  first  systematic  treatise  on 
Political  Economy,  is  entitled  to  the  honour  of  being  called  the 
founder  of  that  scienca  He  was  born  at  Kirkcaldy  in  Fifeshire,  a 
posthumous  child.  At  the  age  of  fourteen  he  entered  Glasgow 
College,  and  after  a  curriculum  of  three  years,  proceeded  thenca 
with  a  Sneil  Exhibition  to  Oxford.  He  was  expected  to  take 
orders  in  the  English  Church,  but  he  preferred  returning  to  Scot- 
land and  taking  his  chance  of  getting  a  professorship  in  one  of  the 
Universities.  Settling  in  Edinburgh  in  1748,  he  began  to  read 
lectures  on  Rhetoric  under  the  patronage  of  Lord  Kames ;  and 
soon  after,  in  1751,  was  elected  Professor  of  Logic  in  the  Univer- 
sity of  Glasgow.  In  1752  he  obtained  the  more  coveted  Chair  of 
Moral  Philosophy,  a  post  made  illustrious  by  Carmichael  and 
Hutcheson.  His  'Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments'  was  published  in 
1759.  In  1763  he  was  induced  to  resign  his  professorship  and 
undertake  the  education  of  the  young  Duke  of  Buccleuch.  He 
travelled  with  his  pupil  for  two  or  three  years,  and  on  his  return 
withdrew  to  his  native  town  of  Kirkcaldy,  and  applied  himself  for 
.  ten  years,  with  little  interruption,  to  solitary  study,  the  fruits  of 
which  at  length  appeared,  in  1776,  in  his  great  work  'The  Wealth 
of  Nations.'  During  the  last  twelve  years  of  his  life  he  held  the 
office  of  Commissioner  of  Customs.  Before  his  death  he  burnt  all 
his  unpublished  manuscripts  with  the  exception  of  a  few  compara- 
tively unimportant  essays. — In  person  he  was  a  grave  preoccupied- 
looking  man,  of  a  stout  middle  size,  with  large  features  and  large 
grey  eyes,  absent-minded  in  company,  often  incontinently  talking 
to  himself,  and  keeping  up  his  rather  poor  constitution  by  strict 
regularity  and  temperance.  He  was  warm  and  affectionate  in 
disposition,  exceedingly  unreserved,  with  simple  frankness  express- 
ing the  thoughts  of  the  moment,  and  with  ready  candour  retract- 
ing his  opinion  if  he  found  that  he  had  spoken  without  just 
grounds.  His  intellectual  proceedings  were  calm,  patient,  and 
regular :  he  mastered  a  subject  slowly  and  circumspectly,  and 
carried  his  principles  with  steady  tenacity  through  multitudes  of 
details  that  would  have  checked  many  men  of  greater  mental 
vigour  unendowed  with  the  same  invincible  persistence.  He  was 
noted  for  his  strength  of  memory,  and  had  a  wide  acquaintance 
with  English,  French,  and  Italian  literature,  his  tastes  inclining 
him  to  the  so-called  classical  school  of  Corneille,  Racine,  Pope,  and 
Gray.  The  principal  feature  of  his  ethical  work  is  his  tracing  the 
operation  of  sympathy  as  the  prime  constituent  of  moral  senti- 
ments. "  The  purely  scientific  inquiry  is  overjaid  by  practical  and 
hortatory  dissertations,  and  by  eloquent  delineations  of  characte 


HISTORY.  481 

r 

and  of  beau-ideals  of  virtuous  conduct.  His  style  being  thus 
pitched  to  the  popular  key,  he  never  pushes  home  a  metaphysical 
analysis ;  so  that  even  his  favourite  theme,  Sympathy,  is  not 
philosophically  sifted  to  the  bottom."  The  most  striking  doctrine 
in  his  '  Wealth  of  Nations '  was  his  advocating  the  abolition  of 
commercial  restrictions — the  doctrine  of  "  Free  Trade."  Concern- 
ing the  sometimes  disputed  originality  of  this  work,  his  editor,  Mr 
M'Culloch,  remarks  :  "  Some  of  the  most  important  doctrines  em- 
bodied in  the  '  Wealth  of  Nations '  had  been  distinctly  announced ; 
and  traces,  more  or  less  faint,  of  the  remainder,  may  be  found  in 
various  works  published  previously  to  its  appearance.  But  this 
has  little  or  nothing  to  do  with  the  peculiar  merits  of  Smith,  and 
in  no  respect  invalidates  his  claim  to  be  considered  as  the  real 
founder  of  the  science  of  political  economy.  Some  of  the  disjecta, 
membra  had,  indeed,  been  discovered,  with  indications  of  the 
others.  But  their  importance,  whether  in  a  practical  or  scientific 
point  of  view,  and  their  dependence,  were  all  but  wholly  unknown. 
They  formed  an  undigested  mass,  without  order  or  any  sort  of 
rational  connection,  what  was  sound  and  true  being  frequently  (as 
in  the  theory  of  the  economists)  closely  linked  to  what  was  false 
and  contradictory.  Smith  was  the  enchanter  who  educed  order 
out  of  this  chaos.  And  in  such  complicated  and  difficult  subjects, 
a  higher  degree  of  merit  belongs  to  the  party  who  first  establishes 
the  truth  of  a  new  doctrine,  and  traces  its  consequences  and  limita- 
tions, than  to  him  who  may  previously  have  stumbled  upon  it  by 
accident,  or  who  had  dismissed  it  as  if  it  were  valueless." — Smith's 
style  is  perspicuous  and  melodious,  and  both  the  language  and 
the  imagery  are  chosen  with  admirable  taste.  Perhaps  its  chief 
value  to  the  student  arises  from  its  copiousness,  which  sometimes 
amounts  to  diffuseness.  He  is  particularly  rich  in  subjective 
language.  It  is  a  good  exercise  for  the  ethical  or  the  economical 
expositor  to  run  over  his  pages  and  note  his  various  modes  of  ex- 
pressing the  same  facts  or  principles.  The  construction  of  his 
sentences  is  loose,  and  wanting  in  vigour. 

HISTORY. 

During  this  period  two  historians  sustained  and  advanced  the 
higher  ideal  of  historical  composition  furnished  by  David  Hume. 
Robertson  published  his  '  History  of  Scotland '  in  the  last  year  of 
the  reign  of  George  IL  (1759),  and  Gibbon  his  'Decline  and  Fall 
of  the  Roman  Empire '  in  the  first  year  of  the  last  quarter  of  the 
century  (1776).  Robertson's  History  was  the  greatest  success 
that  had  been  achieved  by  any  historical  work  up  to  that  time ; 
and  Gibbon's  was  still  more  successful  than  Robertson's. 

William  Robertson  (1721-1793),  the  son  of  an  Edinburgh 

2  H 


482  FROM   1760  TO   1790.  , 

minister,  received  the  usual  Scotch  school  and  college  education, 
entered  the  Established  Church,  and  at  the  early  age  of  twenty- 
two  was  ordained  to  the  charge  of  the  small  parish  of  Gladsmuir 
in  East  Lothian.  The  lightness  of  his  clerical  duties  left  him 
ample  time  fur  study  as  well  as  for  extra-parochial  activity :  he 
read  and  wrote  with  methodical  industry,  attended  the  meetings  of 
a  distinguished  literary  society  in  Edinburgh,  and  made  such  a 
figure  in  the  debates  of  the  General  Assembly  of  the  Church,  that 
he  soon  was  recognised  as  the  leader  of  the  "Moderates."  In 
1759  appeared  his  '  History  of  Scotland,'  the  first  edition  of  which 
was  sold  within  a  month ;  and  in  the  same  year  he  was  translated 
to  the  charge  of  Old  Greyfriars'  in  Edinburgh.  In  1762  he  was 
appointed  Principal  of  the  University.  In  1769  he  completed 
what  is  generally  regarded  as  his  masterpiece,  the  '  History  of 
Charles  V. ' ;  in  1777  his  'History  of  America,'  which  grew  natu- 
rally out  of  the  '  History  of  Charles.'  His  only  other  published 
work,  the  '  Disquisition  on  Ancient  India,'  appeared  in  1791,  about 
two  years  before  his  death. — Robust  in  personal  build,  a  broad, 
square-shouldered  man,  rather  over  the  middle  height,  with  a  large 
head  and  large  features,  Robertson  was  no  less  robust  in  intellect. 
He  seems  to  have  been  well  fitted  for  active  life :  he  displayed 
great  sagacity  and  firmness  as  a  leader  in  the  General  Assembly ; 
and  the  common  saying  about  him  is  that  he  would  have  been 
better  employed  in  acting  history  than  in  writing  it.  He  took 
great  pains  both  with  the  composition  of  his  History  and  with  the 
collection  of  the  facts.  He  particularly  prided  himself,  and  with 
justice,  upon  his  accuracy.  After  all  the  labour  that  he  spent 
upon  his  style,  and  all  the  praises  that  have  been  lavished  upon 
its  purity  and  correctness,  it  is  not  of  much  value  to  the  student 
of  composition.  It  is  undoubtedly  pure  and  correct :  it  contains 
no  Scotch  idioms  and  no  grammatical  inaccuracies ;  but  neither 
does  it  contain  many  peculiarly  English  idioms ;  and  it  possesses 
little  original  charm  of  expression.  Some  of  the  admirers  of 
Robertson  allege  as  a  peculiar  merit  of  his  style  that  it  can  be 
readily  turned  into  Latin ;  and  this  is  another  way  of  saying  that 
it  is  not  distinctively  idiomatic.  Indeed  nothing  else  was  to  be 
expected :  he  had  no  opportunities  of  hearing  English  as  it  was 
spoken,  and  learned  it  almost  as  a  foreign  language  from  books. 
The  wonder  is  that  he  succeeded  in  freeing  himself  so  completely 
from  peculiar  Scotch  idioms.  The  chief  merit  of  his  narrative, 
apart  from  its  superior  accuracy,  is  perspicuous  arrangement :  this 
was  so  much  dwelt  upon  by  contemporary  critics  that  we  must 
suppose  it  to  have  been  a  very  sensible  improvement  on  preceding 
Histories.  Among  other  things  that  have  been  mentioned  as 
coefficient  causes  of  his  extraordinary  success,  besides  the  correct- 
ness and  perspicuity  of  his  style,  and  the  accuracy  of  his  research, 


HISTORY.  483 

are  the  comprehensiveness  of  his  views,  his  singular  insight  into 
political  transactions,  and  the  management  of  his  narrative  so  as 
to  excite  the  interest  of  a  dramatic  plot. 

The  first  year  of  the  last  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century  is 
rather  a  memorable  year  in  prose  literature ;  it  witnessed  the  death 
of  Hume  and  the  publication  of  three  remarkable  works,  Smith's 
'  Wealth  of  Nations,'  Campbell's  '  Philosophy  of  Rhetoric,'  and 
Gibbon's  '  Roman  Empire.' 

Edward  Gibbon  (1737-1794),  the  son  of  a  wealthy  proprietor  in 
Surrey  and  Hampshire,  was  born  at  Putney.  He  was  an  infirm 
child,  the  only  survivor  of  a  family  of  seven,  and  being  sent  to 
school  at  irregular  intervals,  was  allowed  very  much  to  educate 
himself.  Having  free  access  to  good  libraries,  he  read  voraciously, 
particularly  in  historical  works ;  and  when  he  went  to  Oxford  at 
the  age  of  fifteen,  he  possessed  "  a  stock  of  knowledge  that  might 
have  puzzled  a  doctor,  and  a  degree  of  ignorance  of  which  a  school- 
boy would  have  been  ashamed."  At  Oxford  he  had  resided  but 
fourteen  months,  when  meeting  in  the  course  of  his  multifarious 
reading  with  two  productions  from  the  pen  of  Bossuet,  he  was  by 
them  converted  to  the  Roman  Catholic  faith,  and  consequently 
obliged  to  quit  the  University.  He  would  not  seem  to  have  lost 
much  by  this  forced  separation  :  "  To  the  University  of  Oxford," 
he  says,  "  I  acknowledge  no  obligation  ;  and  she  will  as  cheerfully 
renounce  me  for  a  son,  as  I  am  willing  to  disclaim  her  for  a 
mother."  Removed  from  Oxford,  he  was  placed  at  Lausanne  in 
Switzerland,  under  the  care  of  a  pious  clergyman,  who  persuaded 
him  to  return  to  the  Protestant  communion.  At  Lausanne  he  re- 
mained nearly  five  years.  On  his  return  to  England  in  1758,  he 
lived  chiefly  at  his  father's  house  in  Hampshire ;  and,  entering  no 
profession,  continued  the  miscellaneous  studies  that  had  occupied 
him  in  Switzerland.  In  1761  he  made  his  first  appearance  as  an 
author  in  an  essay  on  '  The  Study  of  Literature,'  written  in  French ; 
a  work  that  made  no  impression  at  home,  but  was  very  favourably 
received  abroad.  About  the  same  time  he  was  appointed  a  captain 
in  the  Hampshire  Militia :  he  afterwards  said  that  this  experience 
was  of  use  to  him  when  he  came  to  write  his  history — "  The  dis- 
cipline and  evolutions  of  a  modern  battalion  gave  him  a  clearer 
notion  of  the  phalanx  and  the  legion."  Some  three  years  after 
this,  in  the  course  of  a  tour  in  Italy,  he  conceived  the  idea  of  his 
famous  work :  "  It  was  at  Rome,  on  the  i5th  of  October  1764,  as 
I  sat  musing  amidst  the  ruins  of  the  Capitol,  while  the  bare-footed 
friars  were  singing  vespers  in  the  Temple  of  Jupiter,  that  the  idea 
of  writing  the  decline  and  fall  of  the  city  first  started  to  my  mind." 
He  did  little  towards  the  fulfilment  of  this  conception  till  1770, 
when  the  death  uf  his  father  left  him  master  of  an  ample  fortune. 


484  FKOM   1760  TO   1790. 

The  first  volume  appeared  in  1776,  and  was  received  with  unpre- 
cedented favour ;  the  first  edition  was  disposed  of  in  a  few  days. 
He  completed  the  work  at  Lausanne  in  1787,  and  it  was  pub- 
lished in  1788,  on  his  fifty-first  birthday.  His  death  took  place  in 
the  beginning  of  1794,  about  ten  months  before  the  birth  of  Grote, 
the  historian  of  Greece. 

Gibbon  is  described  as  having  been  in  his  early  years  of  feeble 
constitution  and  slender  frame,  with  a  disproportionately  large  head. 
]n  after-life  he  presented  an  obese  figure,  fashionably  dressed, 
with  a  small  mouth,  a  mellifluous  voice,  and  elegant  and  digni- 
fied manners.  "  His  honourable  and  amiable  disposition,"  says 
lirougham,  who  is  far  from  being  a  generous  critic,  "his  kind  and 
even  temper,  was  praised  by  all,  displayed  as  it  was  in  the  steadi- 
ness of  his  friendships,  and  the  generosity  of  his  conduct  towards 
Deyverdun,  and  indeed  all  who  needed  whatever  help  his  circum- 
stances enabled  him  to  give.  Perhaps  the  warmth  of  his  affection 
was  yet  more  strikingly  exemplified  in  his  steady  attachment  to 
his  kind  aunt,  Miss  Porten,"and  towards  his  venerable  stepmother." 
The  same  authority  objects  to  Mackintosh's  off-hand  opinion  that 
Gibbon  "might  have  been  cut  out  of  a  corner  of  Burke's  mind, 
without  being  missed ; "  and  affirms  that  Burke's  "  whole  writings, 
excellent  as  they  are  for  some  qualities,  will  never  stand  nearly  so 
high  in  the  estimation  of  mankind,  either  for  profound  learning  or 
for  various  usefulness,  as  the  '  Decline  and  Fall.'"  As  regards  the 
peculiar  opinions  of  this  work,  its  hostility  to  Christianity  has 
been  widely  reprobated  and  deplored :  the  author's  insidious  way 
of  accounting  for  the  spread  of  Christianity  by  "  secondary  causes  " 
— that  is,  by  circumstances  apart  from  the  inherent  power  of  the 
religion — has  always  given  especial  offence.  His  excuse  that  he 
might  have  softened  the  two  obnoxious  chapters  (the  i5th  and 
1 6th)  if  he  had  thought  that  "the  pious,  the  timid,  and  the  pru- 
dent, would  feel,  or  affect  to  feel,  with  such  exquisite  sensibility," 
was  more  aggravating  than  apologetic. — Apart  altogether  from  the 
character  of  his  opinions,  his  style  is  very  remarkable — "  copious, 
splendid,  elegantly  rounded,  distinguished  by  supreme  artificial 
skill."  That  it  cannot  be  recommended  as  a  general  model,  is  no 
more  than  must  be  said  of  almost  all  English  authors.  In  spite  of 
its  singularities,  it  must  be  considered  a  valuable  contribution  to 
the  wealth  of  the  language.  He  possessed  in  the  largest  measure 
the  author's  first  great  requisites — a  full  command  of  words,  and 
the  power  of  striking  out  fresh  combinations.  His  chief  mechanical 
peculiarities  are  an  excessive  use  of  the  abstract  noun,  and  an 
unusually  abundant  employment  of  descriptive  and  suggestive 
epithets.  This  last  peculiarity  is  the  main  secret  of  what  is  often 
described  as  the  "pregnancy"  of  his  style;  it  forms  one  of  the 
principal  arts  of  condensation,  brevity,  compression.  He  conveys 


HISTORY.  485 

incidentally,  by  a  passing  adjective,  information  that  Macaulay 
would  have  set  forth  in  a  special  sentence :  from  its  form,  the 
expression  seems  to  take  for  granted  that  the  reader  is  already 
acquainted  with  the  facts  referred  to,  but  substantially  in  an 
allusive  way  it  adds  to  the  knowledge  of  the  most  uninitiated. 

To  this  period  belongs  also  the  most  successful  biography  in  our 
language.  It  was  not  published  till  1791,  but  probably  everything 
except  the  printing  was  executed  before  the  last  year  of  the  present 
division. 

James  Boswell  (1740-1795),  the  only  son  of  the  laird  of  Auchin- 
leck,  in  Ayrshire,  wlio  was  an  Edinburgh  lawyer,  and  rose  to  be 
one  of  the  Lords  of  Session,  was  born  in  Edinburgh,  and  educated 
for  the  law.  He  showed  from  early  manhood  less  fondness  for 
business  than  for  travel  and  literary  company.  At  the  age  of 
twenty-three,  he  set  out  to  make  the  tour  of  Europe,  was  intro- 
duced to  Johnson  as  he  passed  through  London,  and  shaped  the 
course  of  his  travels  so  as  to  obtain  introductions  to  many  of  the 
chief  European  celebrities,  including  Voltaire  and  Rousseau.  On 
his  return,  he  published  in  1768  'An  Account  of  Corsica,  with 
Memoirs  of  General  Paoli ' ;  his  enthusiasm  for  the  Corsicans  and 
their  general  procuring  him  the  nickname  of  "  Corsica  Boswell." 
In  1773  he  accompanied  Johnson  on  his  famous  tour  through  the 
Hebrides;  his  journal  of  this  tour  he  published  in  1785,  the  year 
after  Johnson'B  death.  His  great  work,  'The  Life  of  Johnson,' 
appeared,  as  we  have  said,  six  years  later.  With  all  the  praise 
that  is  lavished  upon  this  biography,  the  author  himself  is  rather 
an  underrated  man.  It  is  pretty  generally  supposed  that  little 
intellectual  power  was  required  for  such  a  production — that  it  is 
merely  an  affair  of  memory  and  observation.  Now  such  powers  of 
memory  and  observation  are  certainly  no  common  endowment ; 
but  these  are  far  from  being  the  only  powers  displayed  in  the 
work.  Casual  readers  are  apt  to  undervalue  the  skill  shown  in  the 
arrangement  and  the  narrative  of  the  facts  and  the  conversations ; 
and  Mncaulay,  who  dilutes  upon  the  meanness  of  spirit  shown  in 
the  drawing  out  of  Johnson's  opinions,  gives  no  credit  to  the  in- 
genuity. Boswell  was  undoubtedly  a  man  of  much  social  tact, 
possessing  great  general  knowledge  of  human  nature,  and  a  most 
penetrating  insight  into  the  thoughts  and  intents  of  his  habitual 
companions.  He  played  upon  the  prejudices  of  Johnson,  and 
gained  his  own  ends,  with  consummate  adroitness.  It  is  but  a 
fair  retort  to  Macaulay,  that  whoever  considers  Boswell  a  "  great 
fool,"  lays  himself  open,  as  regards  that  judgment  at  least,  to  a 
similar  imputation.  His  habit  of  thrusting  himself  upon  cele- 
brated men  was  not  such  an  immorality  as  has  sometimes  been 
represented ;  it  was  at  least  the  most  amiable  and  disinterested 


486  FROM   1760  TO  1790. 

form  of  tuft-hunting.  And  it  is  rather  a  hasty  judgment  to  set 
down  the  fact  that  lie  could  live  on  friendly  terms  with  celebrated 
men  of  every  variety  of  character  and  opinions  to  innate  servility 
of  disposition  ;  a  better-advised,  not  to  say  a  more  generous  judg- 
ment, would  accept  his  own  explanation — that  he  "  ever  delighted 
in  that  intellectual  chemistry  which  can  separate  good  qualities 
from  evil  in  the  same  person,"  and  that  he  endured  the  evil  for  the  . 
Bake  of  the  good. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

Horace  Walpole,  Earl  of  Oxford  (1717-1797),  the  son  of  Sir 
Robert  Walpole,  is  one  of  the  most  felicitous  of  our  minor  writers 
of  prose.  The  peculiarities  of  his  easy  sauntering  disposition  were 
a  great  puzzle  to  Lord  Macaulay:  that  energetic  writer  pronounced 
him  "the  most  eccentric,  the  most  artificial,  the  most  fastidious, 
the  most  capricious  of  men,"  and  said  that  "  his  mind  was  a  bundle 
of  inconsistent  whims  and  affectations."  His  inconsistencies  are 
not  so  startling  when  we  bear  in  mind  the  character  and  station 
of  the  man  ;  he  was  too  fond  of  ease,  too  much  averse  to  effort,  to 
take  the  trouble  of  being  consistent.  His  endeavour  was  to  gratify 
his  various  tastes  at  the  minimum  of  exertion.  He  had  a  taste  for 
pictures  and  for  articles  of  antiquarian  value,  and  haunted  print- 
shops  and  auction  -  rooms ;  he  frequented  clubs  and  went  into 
society,  and  amused  himself  with  retailing  the  gossip  and  the  bon- 
mots  to  lady  and  other  correspondents ;  he  procured  introductions 
to  eminent  and  notorious  individuals ;  in  political  circles  he  en- 
joyed the  mischievous  fun  of  setting  people  together  by  the  ears. 
He  purposely  refrained  from  forming  opinions,  or  purposely  dis- 
sembled them,  that  he  might  be  saved  the  trouble  of  maintaining 
them.  He  was  ambitious  of  literary  distinction,  and  wrote  books : 
but  he  pretended  that  they  were  valueless,  and  disclaimed  the 
title  of  author ;  partly,  no  doubt,  for  the  pleasure  of  so  doing,  but 
partly  also  that  he  might  be  saved  the  effort  of  supporting  a  char- 
acter for  learning.  He  is  described  as  a  very  tall,  slender  man, 
with  dark,  lively,  penetrating  eyes,  and  complexion  of  a  most  un- 
healthy paleness.  His  observant  faculty  and  freedom  from  excite- 
ment gave  him  a  great  advantage  in  witty  repartee  and  impromptu 
turning  of  compliments.  One  of  his  greatest  beauties  of  style  is 
his  skill  in  hitting  off  characteristic  traits.  His  works  are  rather 
voluminous :  writing  would  seem  to  have  been  his  favourite  em- 
ployment: '  Catalogue  of  Royal  and  Noble  Authors,'  1758  ;  'Anec- 
dotes of  Painting,'  1761-71;  'Catalogue  of  Engravers,'  1763; 
'  Castle  of  Otrantu,'  1764;  '  Mysterious  Mother,'  1768;  'Historic 
Doubts  on  the  Life  and  Reign  of  Richard  III,'  1768.  Several 
volumes  of  his  Letters  have  also  been  published. 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  487 

1  Junins.' — The  first  of  the  celebrated  Letters  of  Junius  appeared 
on  the  2ist  of  January  1769,  in  the  '  Public  Advertiser,'  one  of  the 
leading  newspapers  of  the  time.  The  same  writer  had  been,  under 
various  signatures,  an  active  correspondent  for  at  least  two  years 
before,  and  is  supposed  to  have  written  some  of  the  shorter  letters 
that  appeared  in  explanation  and  reinforcement  of  the  views  of 
Junius.  The  letters  under  the  signatures  of  "  Junius  "  and  "  Philo- 
Junius"  had  a  certain  unity  of  theme,  were  more  studied  in  com- 
position, and,  from  a  combination  of  circumstances,  made  by  far 
the  greatest  sensation  in  the  political  world.  At  the  time  when 
they  appeared,  there  was  an  almost  unparalleled  disorganisation 
among  the  rulers  of  the  country : — an  obstinate  king  bent  upon 
asserting  and  extending  his  prerogative  ;  Parliament  distracted  by 
opposite  policies,  and  still  more  by  personal  enmities ;  difficulties 
with  more  than  one  European  power ;  a  growing  quarrel  with  our 
American  colonies ;  and  at  home  an  imbittered  struggle  for  the 
freedom  of  the  press.  Junius  attacked  the  conduct  and  character 
of  the  leading  politicians  with  unprecedented  freedom.  The  mere 
splendour  of  his  language  and  the  energy  of  his  sarcasm  would 
have  made  him  a  reputation ;  but  what  chiefly  attracted  interest 
and  raised  consternation  was  the  knowledge  that  he  showed  of 
State  secrets  and  of  the  private  life  of  his  victims.  The  excite- 
ment grew  when  the  name  of  this  apparent  traitor  to  his  order 
baffled  the  most  determined  inquiries. 

The  authorship  of  Junius  was  never  acknowledged,  either 
publicly  or  privately.  There  are  several  traditions  of  great  per- 
sons who  professed  to  know  all  about  it ;  but  none  of  them  are 
said  to  have  committed  themselves  to  an  express  declaration. 
In  1804,  the  Marquess  of  Lansdowne  asserted  that  "he  knew 
Junius,  and  knew  all  about  the  writing  and  production  of  those 
letters;"  that  Junius  had  never  been  publicly  named;  and  that 
he  purposed  one  day  to  write  a  pamphlet  and  disclose  the  secret: 
but  he  died  and  gave  no  sign.  The  evidence  for  the  authorship  is 
thus  wholly  circumstantial. 

In  the  day  and  generation  of  Junius  himself,  nearly  every  man 
of  distinction  was  named  by  one  person  or  another  as  the  "  Great 
Unknown."  The  preliminary  essay  to  the  1812  edition  of  Junius 
— issued  by  the  son  of  Woodfall,  the  publisher  of  the  '  Public  Ad- 
vertiser,' and  containing  Junius's  private  letters  to  Woodfall,*  along 
with  fac-similes  of  his  handwriting — discusses  the  pretensions  of 
some  twelve  or  more  individuals.  Since  1812  many  volumes  have 
been  written,  solving  the  mystery  with  equal  confidence  in  favour 
of  different  claimants.  Colonel  Barr6,  Lauchlin  Macleane,  Thomas 
Lord  Lyttleton,  Lord  Temple  (with  Lady  Temple  as  amanuensis), 
are  among  the  authors  more  recently  put  forward  at  considerable 
length. 


488  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

The  pretensions  of  Sir  Philip  Francis  have  been  countersigned 
by  an  overwhelming  number  of  authorities.  His  name  was  never 
mentioned  in  connection  with  the  celebrated  Letters  until  1814; 
in  1816,  Mr  John  Taylor,  in  his  "  Junius  Identified  with  a  cele- 
brated Living  Character,"  produced  a  body  of  evidence  that  has 
since  been  very  generally  accepted  as  conclusive.  Brougham, 
Lord  Campbell,  De  Quincey,  Macaulay,  Earl  Stanhope,  and  many 
others  have  declared  themselves  satisfied.  De  Quincey  is  perhaps 
the  most  decided.  Lord  Brougham,  he  says,  does  not  "  state  the 
result  with  the  boldness  which  the  premises  warrant.  Chief- 
Justice  Dallas,  of  the  Common  Pleas,  was  wont  to  say  that  a 
man  arraigned  as  Junius  upon  the  evidence  here  accumulated 
against  Sir  Philip  Francis,  must  have  been  convicted  in  any  court 
of  Europe.  But  I  would  go  much  farther  ;  I  would  say  that  there 
are  single  proofs,  which  (taken  separately  and  apart  from  all  the 
rest)  are  sufficient  to  sustain  the  whole  onus  of  the  charge." 

The  arguments  in  favour  of  the  title  of  Francis  are  such  as  the 
following :  "  Junius "  shows  an  acquaintance  with  the  forms  of 
the  Secretary  of  State's  Office,  and  with  the  business  of  the  War 
Office ;  Francis  began  life  as  a  clerk  in  the  Secretary  of  State's 
Office,  and  was  a  clerk  in  the  War  Office  at  the  time  of  the  ap- 
pearance of  the  Letters.  "  Junius"  shows  a  minute  acquaintance 
with  the  private  life  of  statesmen  and  with  secret  political  man- 
oeuvres ;  Francis  had  means  of  access  to  such  knowledge  through 
his  father,  as  well  as  through  other  channels.  Francis  thus  pos- 
sesses the  preliminary  requisites  for  a  claimant  to  the  honour  or 
dishonour  of  the  authorship.  It  was  possible  for  him,  from  his 
situation  in  life,  to  obtain  the  very  special  and  startling  know- 
ledge displayed  by  "  Junius."  Farther,  it  is  contended  that  the 
character  of  Francis  was  consistent  with  the  characteristic  temper 
of  "  Junius."  Francis  was  an  ambitious  man,  of  proud,  imperious 
disposition,  with  a  certain  generosity  of  public  spirit,  but  of  in- 
tense personal  animosity,  and  very  exacting  in  his  ideal  of  human 
virtue,  especially  as  regarded  his  superiors  in  public  station; — a 
young  man  iu  a  humble  office  jealously  measuring  himself  with 
higher  officials,  and  savage  because  he  had  to  drudge  for  men  that 
he  considered  inferior  to  himself.  Again,  it  is  contended  that 
Francis  possessed  the  requisite  ability.  "  Junius  "  was  evidently 
a  cultivated  and  practised  writer ;  and  Francis  was  in  a  peculiar 
manner  bred  to  the  pen  by  his  father,  and  seems  to  ha\e  begun  at 
an  early  age  to  send  letters  to  the  newspapers  on  passing  events. 
In  addition  to  these  considerations,  which  do  no  more  than  show 
that  Francis  was  capable  of  writing  "  Junius,"  and  had  a  motive 
in  his  own  jealous  ambitious  temper,  there  are  various  alleged 
coincidences  that  bring  the  charge  more  nearly  home.  "  The 
tendency  of  all  the  external  arguments,"  says  De  Quincey,  "drawn 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  489 

from  circumstantial  or  personal  considerations,  from  local  facts,  or 
the  records  of  party,  flows  in  the  very  same  channel ;  with  all  the 
internal  presumptions  derived  from  the  style,  from  the  anomalous 
use  of  words,  from  the  anomalous  construction  of  the  syntax,  from 
the  peculiar  choice  of  images,  from  the  arbitrary  use  of  the  tech- 
nical shorthand  for  correcting  typographical  errors,  from  capricious 
punctuation,  and  even  from  penmanship  (which,  of  itself,  taken 
separately,  has  sometimes  determined  the  weightiest  legal  inter- 
ests). Proofs,  in  fact,  rush  upon  us  more  plentiful  than  black- 
berries ;  and  the  case  ultimately  becomes  fatiguing,  from  the  very 
plethora  and  riotous  excess  of  evidence.  It  would  stimulate  at- 
tention more,  and  pique  the  interest  of  curiosity  more  pungently, 
if  there  were  some  conflicting  evidence,  some  shadow  of  presump- 
tions against  Francis.  But  there  are  none,  absolutely  none." 

One  of  the  chief  arguments  against  the  title  of  Francis  is  that 
he  was  an  exceedingly  vain  man,  and  yet  expressly  denied  the 
authorship.  In  reply  to  this  argument  De  Quincey  is  particu- 
larly ingenious.  He  points  out,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  denial 
is  ambiguous — "most  jesuitically  adapted  to  convey  an  impres- 
sion at  variance  with  the  strict  construction  which  lurks  in  the 
literal  wording."  Secondly,  he  urges  that  Francis  was  debarred 
from  making  the  avowal  by  fear  and  shame.  He  had  obtained 
his  information  by  treachery,  and  he  had  directed  his  ill-nature 
against  some  of  his  principal  benefactors.  To  disclose  the  secret 
would  have  been  to  declare  himself  a  detestable  villain.  And  this 
consideration  is  one  of  the  strongest  corroborative  proofs  of  the 
identity  of  Junius  with  Francis ;  for  who  else  had  the  same 
motive  to  perpetual  secrecy  ?  "  Upon  such  an  account  only  is 
It  possible  to  explain  the  case.  All  other  accounts  leave  it  a 
perpetual  mystery,  unfathomable  upon  any  principles  of  human 
nature,  why  Junius  did  not,  at  least,  make  his  claim  by  means  of 
Borne  last  will  and  testament." 

The  principal  opponent  of  the  "  Franciscan  "  theory  of  Junius, 
as  it  is  called,  is  Mr  Hayward.  Those  who  wish  to  see  all  that 
can  be  pleaded  against  the  verdict  of  the  majority  should  consult 
his  "  More  about  Junius,"  reprinted  from  '  Fraser's  Magazine,' 
Vol.  LXXVI.  The  Franciscans  have  recently  received  strong 
support  from  the  '  Professional  Investigation  of  the  Handwriting 
of  Junius,'  by  Mr  Charles  Chabot,  Expert  Mr  Chabot  is  of 
opinion  that  the  handwriting  of  Junius  is  the  handwriting  of 
Francis  disguised. 

Dr  Francis,  the  father  of  Sir  Philip,  was  an  Irish  clergyman, 
who  settled  in  London  as  author  and  teacher  about  the  middle  of 
the  century.  He  is  known  as  the  translator  of  Horace,  Demos- 
thenes, and  ^Eschinea  He  was  an  active  party  -  writer,  was 
intimate  with  Lord  Holland  and  other  statesmen,  and  was  always 


490  FROM   1760  TO   1790. 

well  stored  with  political  gossip.  Philip,  born  in  Dublin  in  1740, 
was  brought  by  his  father  to  London,  and  received  his  principal 
schooling  at  St  Paul's,  where  he  was  the  master's  most  admired 
pupil  In  1756  he  obtained,  through  his  father's  patron,  Lord 
Holland,  a  junior  clerkship  in  the  Secretary  of  State's  Office,  and 
remained  there,  with  certain  brief  interruptions,  until  1762,  when 
be  was  appointed  first  clerk  in  the  War  Office.  He  held  his  clerk- 
ship iu  the  War  Office  for  ten  years,  during  which  he  is  supposed 
to  have  written  the  "  Candor  "  letters,  "  Junius,"  and  many  letters 
under  other  signatures.  He  resigned  the  clerkship  in  1772,  for 
reasons  that  are  somewhat  obscure.  The  Franciscans  hold  that 
the  motive  was  resentment  at  the  appointment  of  Chamier  as 
Deputy-Secretary,  and  connect  this  with  the  attacks  of  Junius 
upon  that  individual.  In  1773  he  obtained  an  extraordinary 
preferment,  which  the  Franciscans  suppose  to  be  somehow  con- 
nected with  his  authorship  of  Junius.  He  was  made  a  member  of 
the  Supreme  Council  in  Bengal,  with  a  salary  of  ^10,000  a-year. 
In  India  he  persistently  opposed  Warren  Hastings,  and  was 
wounded  by  him  in  a  duel.  Returning  to  England  in  1780,  he 
entered  Parliament,  and  became  an  active  supporter  of  the  Whigs. 
He  died  in  1818. 

The  leading  feature  in  the  mechanical  part  of  the  style  of 
"Junius"  is  the  predominance  of  the  balanced  structure — "the 
poised  and  graceful  structure  of  the  sentences;"  and  the  leading 
"  quality  "  of  the  style  is  sarcasm,  sometimes  elaborately  polished, 
sometimes  inclining  to  coarse,  unvarnished  abuse.  The  imagery  is 
also  much  admired,  and  the  expression  is  often  felicitous,  though 
far  from  being  of  the  first  order  of  originality. 

John  Home  Tooke  (1736-1812)  is  best  known  in  literature  by 
a  philological  work,  'The  Diversions  of  Purley'  (pub.  1786);  but 
his  general  fame  rests  more  upon  his  political  activity.  Made  a 
clergyman  against  his  will  by  his  father,  a  wealthy  London  poul- 
terer, he  nevertheless  engaged  actively  in  politics  on  the  Radical 
side ;  and  finding  himself  trammelled  by  the  clerical  character,  he 
resigned  his  living  in  1773,  and  studied  law.  He  twice  suffered 
for  his  "advanced"  opinions.  He  was  fined  and  imprisoned  in 
1777  for  accusing  the  king's  troops  of  having  "murdered"  the 
American  insurgents  at  Lexington ;  and  in  1794  he  was  tried  for 
high  treason,  mainly  on  account  of  his  connection  with  the  Con- 
stitutional Society  during  the  excitement  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion. Yet,  upon  the  whole,  he  prospered.  Having  rendered  some 
service  to  Mr  Tooke  of  Purley,  he  was  made  that  gentleman's  heir, 
and  assumed  his  name ;  and  he  spent  his  latter  years  in  literary 
leisure  and  genial  society  at  Wimbledon.  During  his  active  life 
he  made  several  unsuccessful  attempts  to  gain  a  seat  in  Parlia- 
ment, and  at  last  entered  as  representative  of  tlie  rotten  borough 


MISCELLANEOUS   WRITERS.  491 

of  Old  Sarum  in  1801.  Tn  1802  he  was  excluded  from  the  House ; 
his  exclusion  being  a  most  startling  exemplification  of  two  prin- 
ciples— one  that  no  priest  can  lay  aside  his  orders  and  become  a 
layman,1  and  the  other  (enacted  in  1802  for  the  express  purpose  of 
ousting  Tooke)  that  no  one  in  priest's  orders  can  sit  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  His  etymological  '  Diversions '  arose  out  of  his 
political  career.  He  began  to  theorise  in  prison  upon  the  con- 
struction by  the  judges  of  certain  propositions  in  a  case  quoted 
against  him  on  his  trial  in  1777.  This  perhaps  accounts  for  his 
proceeding  upon  what  is  justly  described  as  the  "monstrous" 
principle  that  "  the  etymological  history  of  words  is  our  true  guide, 
both  as  to  the  present  import  of  the  words  themselves,  and  as  to 
the  nature  of  those  things  which  they  are  intended  to  signify." 
Apart  from  this,  he  is  very  ingenious  in  his  attempts  to  trace  how 
the  language  of  mind  has  been  borrowed  from  the  language  of 
external  things,  and  how  conjunctions  and  other  syntactic  particles 
of  speech  have  been  derived  from  significant  nouns  and  verbs. 
But  the  main  interest  of  the  'Diversions'  to  the  general  reader 
lies  in  the  witty  intermixture  of  political  thrusts  and  declamations. 

No  other  prose  writers  within  this  period  have  any  special  in- 
terest. The  writings  of  the  eccentric  James  Burnet,  Lord  Mon- 
boddo  (1714-1799),  contain  interesting  passages,  such  as  his  theory 
about  the  origin  of  man,  and  his  humorously  extravagant  defence 
of  the  superiority  of  ancient  over  modern  writers ;  but  the  interest 
is  more  in  the  matter  than  in  any  felicity  or  original  force  of 
expression. 

J  .Repealed  in 


CHAPTER    IX. 


FROM    1790   TO    l82Q. 


WILLIAM       PALEY, 

1743—1805. 

THE  middle  thirty  years  of  Paley's  life  coincided  very  nearly  with 
the  preceding  period ;  but  as  most  of  his  works l  were  published 
in  the  beginning  of  this  period,  we  take  him  as  belonging  to  it. 

His  life  was  easy  and  prosperous,  without  any  striking  turns 
either  of  hardship  or  of  good  fortune.  He  was  born  at  Peter- 
borough, his  father  being  a  minor  canon  in  the  Cathedral.  His 
father  was  afterwards  appointed  head-master  of  the  grammar- 
school  of  Giggleswick  in  Yorkshire,  and  the  family  removed  there. 
Though  not  very  precocious  as  a  boy,  he  gave  such  proofs  of 
shrewdness  and  intellectual  force  as  to  raise  high  expectations  of  his 
future  eminence.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  was  entered  as  a  sizar  at 
Christ's  College,  Cambridge.  It  is  said  on  his  own  authority  that 
he  was  at  first  an  idle  student,  and  loved  company  better  than  his 
books,  and  that  he  made  a  remorseful  resolution  to  read  hard  when 
one  of  his  idle  companions  reproved  him  for  wasting  his  talents. 
He  probably  exaggerated  the  effect  of  this  reprimand ;  but  how- 
ever that  may  be,  he  did  become  a  hard  student,  and  eventually 
came  out  senior  wrangler.  He  taught  Latin  for  three  years  in  an 
academy  at  Greenwich.  In  1766  he  was  elected  to  a  fellowship  in 
his  college,  and  appointed  a  lecturer.  One  of  his  college  friends 
was  a  son  of  Bishop  Law,  and  through  the  bishop's  influence  he 

1  The  list  is :  '  Moral  and  Political  Philosophy,'  1785 ;  '  Horse  Paulinas,  or 
The  Truth  of  the  Scripture  History  of  St  Paul  evinced,'  1790  ;  '  A  View  of  the 
Evidences  of  Christianity,'  1794 ;  '  Natural  Theology,'  1802.  There  are  published 
also  several  of  his  Sermons. 


WILLIAM   PALEY.  493 

was  preferred  from  one  benefice  to  another  in  the  see  of  Carlisle. 
His  '  Moral  Philosophy '  was  based  upon  the  lectures  he  delivered 
in  his  college.  Upon  the  publication  of  his  '  Evidences  of  Chris- 
tianity'  in  1794,  he  was  rewarded  by  three  several  bishops  with 
preferments  amounting  in  all  to  considerably  more  than  j£2ooo. 
From  some  unknown  cause  or  causes,  he  never  obtained  a  bishopric. 
In  the  course-  of  his  leisure  he  found  time  to  write  the  works  we 
have  mentioned.  He  died  at  Bishop  Wearmouth  on  the  25th  of 
May  1805. 

In  person  Paley  was  above  the  middle  height,  of  a  stout  make, 
inclining  in  his  later  years  to  corpulence.  A  good,  easy  man,  he 
was  rather  careless  about  his  attire,  and  his  homely  manners  and 
provincial  accent  are  said  to  have  stood  in  the  way  of  his  elevation 
to  the  bench. 

His  intellect  was  clear  and  steady.  He  is  a  shining  example  of 
the  form  of  practical  good  sense  characteristic  of  Englishmen.  He 
did  not  hunt  after  paradoxes  and  subtleties,  nor  did  he  throw  him- 
self with  eagerness  into  original  investigations.  He  liked  to  walk 
on  sure  ground,  and  made  abundant  use  of  the  labours  of  others. 
Good  sense  is  the  distinguishing  quality  of  his  '  Moral  and  Political 
Philosophy.'  In  the  case  of  such  a  question  as  the  existence  of  a 
moral  sense,  he  enters  into  no  subtle  disquisition,  but  puts  the 
thing  at  once  to  a  rough  and  simple  test ;  and  such  theories  as 
that  of  "  natural  right "  he  at  once  sets  aside  as  groundless.  In 
his  '  Evidences  of  Christianity,'  which  has  long  been  the  text- 
book on  the  subject,  he  does  little  more  than  popularise  the  con- 
densed Butler  and  the  voluminous  Lardner.  The  '  Horae  Paulinse ' 
and  the  'Natural  Theology'  are  the  product  of  no  more  subtle 
qualities  of  mind  than  patient  industry  and  shrewdness. 

He  was  sober  and  temperate  in  his  feelings,  a  most  unromantic 
and  unpoetic  man.  At  school  and  at  the  university  he  was  much 
sought  after  as  a  boon  companion ;  his  good-humour  and  drollery, 
set  off  by  his  rather  cumbrous  and  slovenly  exterior,  making  him 
a  great  favourite.  Throughout  life  he  retained  his  social  neigh- 
bourly ways,  keeping  up  acquaintance  with  his  parishioners  in 
homely,  unostentatious  intercourse.  His  writings  contain  little  or 
nothing  to  satisfy  the  emotions ;  occasionally  we  cross  a  pleasant 
vein  of  irony  or  sarcasm,  and  we  are  constantly  entertained  with 
homely  facts,  but  high-flown  sentiment  is  totally  wanting.1 

i  Discoursing  on  Human  Happiness  in  his  Philosophy  he  openly  disclaims 
refined  sentiment:  "I  will  omit  much  usual  declamation  on  the  dignity  and 
capacity  of  our  nature ;  the  superiority  of  the  soul  to  the  body,  of  the  rational 
to  the  animal  part  of  our  constitution ;  upon  the  worthiness,  refinement,  and 
delicacy  of  some  satisfactions,  or  the  meanness,  grossness,  and  sensuality  of 
others  ;  because  I  hold  that  pleasures  differ  in  nothing  bat  in  continuance  and 
intensity." 


494  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

His  easy  compliant  temper,  and  shrewd  steady  intellect,  were 
the  ruling  principles  of  his  conduct  True,  he  was  ambitious  of 
literary  distinction,  but  he  pursued  his  ambition  by  safe  and  easy 
paths.  He  was  eminently  "loyal  to  facts";  he  recognised  their 
supremacy  without  a  struggle.  At  college  he  proposed  to  defend 
the  thesis  that  eternity  of  punishment  is  contrary  to  the  divine 
attributes ;  but  when  his  tutor  expressed  disapproval,  he  simply 
placed  a  "not"  before  "contrary,"  and  reversed  his  arguments. 
Later  in  life,  when  charged  with  some  inconsistency,  he  made  the 
humorous  remark  that  "  he  could  not  afford  to  keep  a  conscience." 
As  clergyman  and  author,  he  got  through  his  work  by  steady  regu- 
larity. Everything  had  its  allotted  time,  and  in  his  untroubled 
existence  there  were  few  interruptions  to  his  settled  plans. 

Opinions. — It  is  probably  owing  to  the  prestige  of  Paley's  doc- 
trines that  Utilitarianism  is  so  often  and  so  obstinately  identified 
with  selfishness.  To  class  Paley  with  the  Utilitarians  of  the  pres- 
ent day  is  misleading.  He  agrees  with  them  fully  in  one  point, 
and  in  one  point  only — namely,  in  repudiating  Innate  moral  dis- 
tinctions. On  a  very  fundamental  point  he  is  utterly  at  variance 
with  them ;  he  allows  no  merit  to  disinterested  action,  as  such. 
In  Paley's  view,  they  only  are  praiseworthy  that  act  from  a  regard 
to  their  own  everlasting  happiness.  In  matters  of  religion,  what- 
ever may  have  been  Paley's  private  opinions,  he  published  nothing 
inconsistent  with  the  Thirty-Nine  Articles.  In  one  solitary  point 
he  showed  a  tendency  to  be  latitudinarian  ;  he  wrote,  in  defence  of 
his  patron  Bishop  Law,  a  pamphlet  against  the  propriety  of  requir- 
ing Subscription  to  Articles  of  Faith. 

He  was  eminently  free  from  bigotry,  and  wrote  in  favour  of  the 
most  enlightened  tolerance,  with  an  exception  against  works  of 
"  ridicule,  invective,  and  mockery."  "  Every  species  of  intoler- 
ance which  enjoins  suppression  and  silence,  and  every  species  of 
persecution  which  enforces  such  injunctions,  is  adverse  to  the  pro- 
gress of  truth."  In  the  matter  of  Church  government  he  held  that 
"  if  the  dissenters  from  the  establishment  become  a  majority  of  the 
people,  the  establishment  itself  ought  to  be  altered  or  qualified." 

He  had  the  humanity  to  write  strongly  against  the  slave  trade, 
and  to  refute  every  shred  of  argument  that  could  be  urged  in  its 
favour. 

ELEMENTS   OP   STYLE,  » 

Vocabulary. — Although  Paley's  language  is  not  studiously  varied, 
he  never  seems  to  be  in  want  of  words,  and  the  combinations  are 
often  agreeably  fresh.  His  preference  is  for  homely  words  ;  but  he 
does  not  scruple  to  use  the  most  technical  terms,  and  now  and  then 


WILLIAM   PALEY.  495 

even  quotes  Latin,  trusting  to  make  himself  intelligible  to  the 
ordinary  capacity  by  the  power  of  his  homely  illustrations. 

Sentences  and  Paragraphs. — The  chief  thing  worth  noticing  about 
Paley's  sentences  is  that  they  are  not  constructed  upon  a  few  favour- 
ite forms,  or  with  any  leaning  to  a  favourite  rhythm.  His  is  not  a 
"formed"  style;  he  is  studious  to  express  himself  in  simple  lan- 
guage, without  regard  to  measure  or  fluent  melody. 

It  might  be  expected  that,  having  no  misleading  desire  for 
euphonious  combinations,  he  would  adopt  the  best  arrangement 
for  emphasis.  But  it  is  not  so ;  he  had  not  much  natural  turn  for 
point,  and  does  not  seem  to  have  been  aware  of  the  advantage  of 
calling  special  attention  to  a  word  by  its  position. 

The  construction  of  his  paragraphs  is  worth  examining  minutely, 
(i.)  The  first  thing  that  strikes  us  in  turning  over  his  pages  with 
an  eye  to  the  paragraph  division  is  the  unusual  number  of  para- 
graphs. Every  statement  that  he  wishes  to  make  prominent,  he 
places  in  a  paragraph  by  itself.  Thus — 

"  It  will  be  our  business  to  show,  if  we  can, 

"  I.   What  Human  Happiness  does  not  consist  in  i 

"  II.  What  it  does  consist  in. 

"  FIKST,  then,  Happiness  does  not  consist,"  4c. 

Again — 

"  The  above  account  of  human  happiness  will  justify  the  two  following 
conclusions,  which,  although  found  in  most  books  of  morality,  have  seldom, 
I  think,  been  supported  by  any  sufficient  reasons  : — 

"  FIRST,  That  happiness  is  pretty  equally  distributed  amongst  the  differ- 
ent orders  of  civil  society  : 

"SECONDLY,  That  vice  has  no  advantage  over  virtue,  even  with  respect 
to  this  world's  happiness. " 

Once  more — 

"  The  four  CARDINAL  virtues  are,  prudence,  fortitude,  temperance,  and 
justice. 

"  But  the  division  of  virtue,  to  which  we  are  in  modern  times  most  accus- 
tomed, is  into  duties: — 

"Towards  God;  as  piety,  reverence,  resignation,  gratitude,  &c. 

"  Towards  other  men  (or  relative  duties) ;  as  justice,  charity,  fidelity, 
loyalty,  &c. 

"Towards  ourselves;  as  chastity,  sobriety,  temperance,  preservation  of 
life,  care  of  health,  &c." 

The  above  short  extracts  show  his  arts  of  giving  prominence  to 
leading  statements  :md  leading  words.  He  uses  separate  para- 
graphs ;  he  makes  divisions  conspicuous  sometimes  by  figures — 
L,  II.,  <fec.,  sometimes  by  numbers  printed  in  small  capitals — 
FIRST,  SECONDLY,  &c.;  he  emphasises  leading  words  by  printing 
them  in  small  capitals  or  in  italics.  The  first  chapter  of  the  book 
on  '  Moral  Obligations '  upon  the  question,  Why  am  I  obliged  to 


496  FROM   1790  TO    1820. 

Icf-ep  my  word  1  is  a  very  happy  example  of  his  perspicuous  method 
His  chief  defect  in  this  respect  is  in  the  arts  of  indicating  degrees 
of  subordination.  He  has  nothing  but  the  difference  between  capi- 
tals and  italics,  and  the  difference  between  Roman  numbers  (L,  IL, 
<fec.)  and  Arabic  (i,  2,  &c.)  Owing  to  this  defect,  the  multiplicity 
of  small  paragraphs  is  not  a  little  confusing  when  we  attempt  to 
take  in  a  chapter  at  a  comprehensive  glance.  It  would  be  a  great 
advantage  if  the  most  important  statements  were  printed  in  larger 
type. 

(2.)  The  next  thing  that  strikes  us  is  the  fulness  of  his  phrases 
of  reference,  and  the  consequent  ease  of  following  his  exposition. 
We  are  constantly  kept  to  the  point  by  such  phrases  as — "  We  will 
explain  ourselves  by  an  example  or  two;"  "This  will  serve  for  one 
instance ;  another  is  the  following ; "  "  For  this  is  the  alternative. 
Either  .  .  .  or  .  .  .  ; "  and  so  forth. 

(3.)  When  we  take  special  paragraphs  in  detail,  we  find  that  the 
exposition  is  not  so  perspicuous  as  we  should  expect  from  the  per- 
spicuity of  the  larger  divisions.  On  examination  we  find  the  rea- 
son to  be  that  he  does  not  always  keep  the  main  subject  prominent, 
but  in  his  easy  way  changes  the  point  of  view.  In  the  following 
passage,  though  the  separate  statements  are  simple,  they  cannot 
be  put  together  coherently  without  an  effort : — 

"  The  art  in  which  the  secret  of  human  happiness  consists,  is  to  set  the 
habits  in  such  a  manner  that  every  change  may  he  a  change  for  the  better. 
The  habits  themselves  are  much  the  same  ;  lor  whatever  is  made  habitual, 
becomes  smooth  and  easy,  and  nearly  inditi'erent.  The  return  to  an  old 
habit  is  likewise  easy,  whatever  the  habit  be.  Therefore  the  advantage  is 
with  those  habits  which  allow  of  an  indulgence  in  the  deviation  from  them." 

Here  the  remark  about  the  return  to  an  old  habit  is  not  so  put  as 
to  show  its  relevance.  It  were  better  omitted  at  that  particular 
stage.  Perhaps  the  following  would  be  a  simpler  statement : — 

"  The  great  art  of  human  happiness  is  to  set  the  habits  in  such  a  manner 
that  every  change  may  be  a  change  for  the  better.  In  a  habit  itself  there 
is  little  either  of  pleasure  or  of  pain  ;  whatever  is  made  habitual  becomes 
smooth,  easy,  and  nearly  indifferent.  The  pleasure  or  pain  lies  in  the  de- 
parture from  a  habit.  This  being  so,  our  wisdom  is  to  form  such  habits  as 
may  be  changed  for  the  better,  and  are  not  likely  to  be  changed  for  the 
worse. " 

To  be  sure,  the  difference  between  the  two  modes  of  statement  ia 
slight ;  still  in  exposition  every  little  helps,  and  changes  that  seem 
trifling  in  a  short  passage,  may,  if  carried  through  a  chapter,  make 
a  very  substantial  difference  to  the  ease  of  the  reader.  It  is  only 
by  slight  changes  that  Paley's  method  can  be  improved  upon  ;  and 
the  student  of  popular  exposition  would  do  well  to  attend  to  sucb 
improvements. 


WILLIAM   TALEY.  497 


QUALITIES   OF   STYLE. 

Simplicity  and  Perspicuity  are  the  eminent  qualities  of  Paley's 
style.  We  have  already  said  that  the  diction,  though  occasionally 
Latinised  and  technical,  is  upon  the  whole  familiar,  and  that  the 
structure,  with  certain  possibilities  of  improvement,  is  upon  the 
whole  perspicuous  and  easy  to  follow.  But  the  simple  diction  and 
perspicuous  structure  are  by  no  means  the  only  elements  of  his 
popular  style. 

(i.)  It  is  somewhat  of  a  paradox  to  say  concerning  a  writer  on 
Moral  and  Political  Philosophy,  Christian  Evidences,  and  Natu- 
ral Theology,  that  his  subject-matter  is  not  abstruse.  Of  course, 
Paley's  subject-matter  is  abstruse  compared  with  the  subject-matter 
of  mere  narrative,  or  of  essays  on  the  minor  morals.  But  it  is  not 
so  abstruse  as  it  might  be,  considering  the  professed  themes.  He 
is  careful  not  to  take  up  any  doctrine  that  is  too  deep  or  too  subtle 
for  popular  exposition.  He  knows  either  by  instinct  or  by  definite 
purpose  where  to  stop.  He  makes  no  pretence  of  going  to  the  very 
root  of  a  matter.  In  discussing  moral  obligation  he  does  not  enter 
upon  the  Freedom  of  the  Will.  In  his  'Natural  Theology'  he 
does  not  enter  upon  external  perception.  In  considering  cases  of 
conscience,  he  restricts  himself  to  "  the  situations  which  arise  in 
the  life  of  an  inhabitant  of  this  country  in  these  times."  "  I  have," 
he  says,  "  examined  no  doubts,  I  have  discussed  no  obscurities,  I 
have  encountered  no  errors,  I  have  adverted  to  no  controversies, 
but  what  I  have  seen  actually  to  exist."  In  saying  all  this,  we 
must  not  forget  that  such  subjects  as  Paley  does  think  fit  to  dis- 
cuss might  be  treated  in  a  very  abstruse  manner.  Only  it  is  neces- 
sary to  remember  that  the  popular  character  of  his  exposition 
depends  to  some  extent  upon  the  choice  of  subject-matter. 

(2.)  He  has  a  habit  of  stating  principles  in  their  application  to 
a  concrete  case,  and  he  chooses  very  homely  illustrations.  These 
are  undoubtedly  the  main  secrets  of  the  simplicity  of  his  style. 

A  good  example  of  his  simple  way  of  stating  disputed  principles 
by  bringing  them  to  bear  on  a  supposed  case,  is  seen  in  his  chapter 
on  the  "  moral  sense."  He  begins  the  chapter  by  relating  the 
story  of  Caius  Toranius,  who  in  the  proscription  by  the  trium- 
virate was  betrayed  to  the  executioners  by  his  own  son.  He 
then  proceeds : — 

"  Now  the  question  is,  whether,  if  this  story  were  related  to  the  wild  boy 
caught  some  years  ago  in  the  woods  of  Hanover,  or  to  a  savage  without  ex- 
perience, and  without  instruction,  cut  off  in  his  infancy  from  all  intercourse 
with  his  species,  and,  consequently,  under  no  possible  influence  of  example, 
authority,  education,  sympathy,  or  habit ;  whether,  I  say,  such  a  one  would 
feel,  upon  the  relation,  any  degree  of  that  sentiment  of  disajtprobalion  of 
1'oranius's  conduct  which  we  feel,  or  not? 

2  I 


498  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

"They  who  maintain  the  existence  of  a  moral  sense;  of  innate  maxims; 
of  a  natural  conscience  ;  that  the  love  of  virtue  and  hatred  of  vice  are 
instinctive  ;  or  the  perception  of  right  and  wrong  intuitive  ;  (all  which 
are  only  different  ways  of  expressing  the  same  opinion,)  affirm  that  he, 
would. 

"  They  who  deny  the  existence  of  a  moral  sense,  &c.,  affirm  that  he  would 
not. 

"  And  upon  this,  issue  is  joined. 

"As  the  experiment  has  never  been  made,  and,  from  the  difficulty  of 
procuring  a  subject  (not  to  mention  the  impossibility  of  proposing  the 
question  to  him,  if  we  had  one),  is  never  likely  to  be  made,  what  would 
be  the  event,  can  only  be  judged  of  from  probable  reasons." 

He  then  proceeds  to  state  the  pros  and  cons. 

No  better  instance  could  be  had  of  the  simplicity  of  his  ex- 
amples and  comparisons  than  the  well-known  pigeon  illustration. 
It  constitutes  the  first  chapter  of  the  book  on  'Relative  Duties,' 
and  is  headed  On  Property  : — 

"  If  you  should  see  a  flock  of  pigeons  in  a  field  of  corn  ;  and  if  (instead  of 
each  picking  where  and  what  it  liked,  taking  just  as  much  as  it  wanted,  and 
no  more)  you  should  see  ninety-nine  of  them  gathering  all  they  got  into  a 
heap  ;  reserving  nothing  for  themselves  but  the  chaff  and  the  refuse  ;  keep- 
ing this  heap  for  one,  and  that  the  weakest,  perhaps  worst,  pigeon  of  the 
flock ;  sitting  round  and  looking  on,  all  the  winter,  whilst  this  one  was 
devouring,  throwing  about,  and  wasting  it :  and  if  a  pigeon  more  hardy  or 
hungry  than  the  rest,  touched  a  grain  of  the  hoard,  all  the  others  instantly 
fl}  ing  upon  it,  and  tearing  it  to  pieces  ;  if  you  should  see  this,  you  would 
see  nothing  more  than  what  is  every  day  practised  and  established  among 
men.  Among  men,  you  see  the  ninety -and -nine,  toiling  and  scraping 
together  a  heap  of  superfluities  for  one  (and  this  one,  too,  oftentimes  the 
feeblest  and  worst  of  the  whole  set,  a  child,  a  woman,  a  mailman,  or  a  fool), 
getting  nothing  for  themselves  all  the  while  but  a  little  of  the  coarsest  of 
the  provision  which  their  own  industry  produces  ;  looking  quietly  on,  while 
they  see  the  fruits  of  all  their  labour  spent  or  spoiled  ;  and  if  one  of  the 
number  take  or  touch  a  particle  of  the  hoard,  the  others  joining  against  him, 
and  hanging  him  for  the  theft"1 

Clearness. — Perspicuity  is  possessed  by  Paley  in  a  very  high 
degree,  but  the  precision  of  his  statements  and  definitions  is  a 
good  deal  affected  by  his  paramount  desire  to  be  popular.  Too 
clear-headed  to  run  into  confusion,  he  is  at  the  same  time  anxious 
to  accommodate  himself  to  the  plainest  intelligence,  and,  like 
many  simple  writers,  purchases  simplicity  at  the  expense  of 
exactness.  His  purpose  is  to  be  easily  understood  by  the  mass, 
and  he  deliberately  and  avowedly  prefers  a  division  or  definition 
because  it  is  common  and  popular.  His  classification  of  the 
virtues  is  an  example  (see  p.  495).  His  consideration  of  "what 

1  An  account  of  Paley  can  hardly  be  considered  complete  without  this  illus- 
tration. It  has  a  historic  interest.  It  is  said  that  when  Paley's  name  was  sug- 
gested to  George  III.  as  one  that  might  deserve  a  bishopric,  the  King  cried — 
"  Paley  ? — hae  !  hae !  pigeon  Paley  ? "  whereby  our  author's  hopes  of  such  pro- 
motion were  ruined  for  ever. 


WILLIAM  PALEY.  499 

we  mean  to  gay  when  a  man  is  OBLIGED  to  do  a  thing"  is  a 
favourable  specimen  of  his  popular  way  of  defining,  and  of  bis 
care  to  be  as  exact  as  is  consistent  with  popular  usage : — 

"A  man  is  said  to  be  obliged  '  when  he  is  urged  by  a  violent  motive  result- 
ing from  the  command  of  another.' 

"FIRST,  'The  motive  must  be  violent'  If  a  person  who  has  done  me 
some  little  service,  or  has  a  small  place  in  his  disposal,  ask  me  upon  some 
occasion  for  my  vote,  I  may  possibly  give  it  him,  from  a  motive  of  gratitude 
or  expectation :  but  I  should  hardly  say  that  I  was  obliged  to  give  it  him  ; 
because  the  inducement  does  not  rise  high  enough.  Whereas,  if  a  father  or 
a  master,  auy  great  benefactor,  or  one  on  whom  my  fortune  depends,  require 
my  vote,  I  give  it  him  of  course,  and  my  answer  to  all  who  ask  me  why  I 
voted  so  and  so  is,  that  my  father  or  my  master  obliged  me  ;  that  I  had  re- 
ceived so  many  favours  from,  or  had  so  great  a  dependence  upon,  such  a  one, 
that  I  was  obliged  to  vote  as  he  directed  me. 

"SKCONDLY,  'It  must  result  from  the  command  of  another.'  Offer  a 
man  a  gratuity  for  doing  anything — for  seizing,  for  example,  an  offender — 
he  is  not  obliged  by  your  offer  to  do  it ;  nor  would  he  say  he  is  ;  though  he 
may  be  induced,  persuaded,  prevailed  upon,  tempted.  If  a  magistrate  or  the 
man's  immediate  superior  command  it,  he  considers  himself  as  obliged  to 
comply,  though  probably  he  would  lose  less  by  a  refusal  in  this  case  than  in 
the  former. 

"  I  will  not  undertake  to  say  that  the  words  obligation  and  obliged  are 
used  uniformly  in  this  sense,  or  always  with  this  distinction  :  nor  is  it  pos- 
sible to  tie  down  popular  phrases  to  any  constant  signification ;  but  wher- 
ever the  motive  is  violent  enough,  and  coupled  with  the  idea  of  command, 
authority,  law,  or  the  will  of  a  superior,  there,  I  take  it,  we  always  reckon 
ourselves  to  be  obliged. 

"And  from  this  account  of  obligation,  it  follows,  that  we  can  be  obliged 
to  nothing,  but  what  we  ourselves  are  to  gain  or  lose  something  by :  for 
nothing  else  can  be  a  'violent  motive '  to  us.  As  we  should  not  be  obliged 
to  obey  the  laws  or  the  magistrate,  unless  rewards  or  punishments,  pleasure 
or  pain,  somehow  or  other  depended  upon  our  obedience;  so  neither  should 
we,  without  the  same  reason,  be  obliged  to  do  what  is  right,  to  practise 
virtue,  or  to  obey  the  commands  of  God." 

Strength,  tScc. — The  preceding  extracts  give  a  fair  idea  of  the 
amount  of  force  in  Puley's  composition ;  he  never  soars  or  de- 
claims. No  other  quality  of  his  style  need  be  specially  noticed. 
We  have  already  remarked  his  indifference  to  melody  in  the 
structure  of  his  sentences.  Unless  in  the  vulgarity  of  his  illus- 
trations, he  cannot  be  said  to  offend  against  good  taste ;  he  is  a 
homely  expositor  who  never  even  in  an  illustration  makes  any 
pretence  to  touch  the  finer  sensibilities,  and  never  being  in  the 
region  of  art,  cannot  be  caught  trespassing. 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Description, — Paley's  anatomical  descriptions  in  his  'Natural 
Theology '  have  been  much  admired.  There  is  nowhere,  perhaps, 
a  better  field  for  the  display  of  perspicuous  descriptive  power 
than  in  describing  the  complicated  mechanism  of  the  humau 


500  FROM   1790  TO  1820. 

body.  It  is,  however,  hardly  fair  to  compare  Paley  with  system- 
atic writers  on  anatomy,  and  to  praise  the  lucidity  of  his  descrip- 
tions at  their  expense.  He  has  an  advantage  over  them  in  taking 
up  the  contrivances  of  the  human  mechanism  only  in  so  far  as 
they  subserve  certain  ends,  confining  himself  to  their  obvious 
points  of  suitability  to  those  ends,  and'not  entering  into  puzzling 
intricacies  of  detail.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  but  justice  to  his 
extraordinary  powers  of  perspicuous  arrangement  to  say  that  sys- 
tematic writers  might  often  take  a  lesson  from  him. 

He  seems  to  have  been  a  ware  of  the  great  art  of  preventing 
confusion  in  complicated  descriptions  —  the  art  of  keeping  the 
leading  features  prominently  before  the  reader.  This  he  was 
enabled  to  effect  more  easily  in  many  cases  by  the  intention  of 
his  work.  He  wished  to  show  how  exquisitely  various  parts  are 
adapted  to  particular  ends,  and  thus  had  ready  to  his  hand  an 
easy  principle  of  lucid  arrangement.  He  treats  the  body  simply 
as  a  piece  of  machinery,  or  rather  as  an  assemblage  of  machines, 
and  describes  each  part  only  in  so  far  as  it  performs  some  par- 
ticular function.  Take,  for  example,  his  description  of  the  spine 
or  backbone.  He  does  not  attempt  to  deal  with  all  its  compli- 
cations at  once ;  he  separates  its  contrivances  into  three  groups 
according  to  the  purposes  that  they  serve,  according  as  they 
contribute  to  stability  or  firmness,  to  flexibility,  or  to  the  safe 
conveyance  of  the  spinal  marrow. 

His  mastery  of  familiar  figures  was  of  signal  service  to  him  in 
his  endeavours  to  put  the  reader  at  starting  in  possession  of  a 
comprehensive  idea  of  the  subject  of  his  description.  To  illus- 
trate this  we  shall  quote  the  beginning  of  his -account  of  the 
circulation  of  the  blood.  The  quotation  also  illustrates  what 
may  be  laid  down  as  a  principle  in  the  description  of  mechanical 
contrivances — namely,  that  we  should  begin  by  stating  the  pur- 
pose, as  giving  the  most  comprehensive  idea  of  the  mechanism  : — • 

"The  utility  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood,  I  assume  as  an  acknowledged 
point.  One  grand  purpose  is  plainly  answered  by  it ;  the  distributing 
to  every  part,  every  extremity,  every  nook  and  corner  of  the  body,  the 
nourishment  which  is  received  into  it  by  one  aperture.  What  enters  at  the 
mouth  finds  its  way  to  the  fingers'  ends.  A  more  difficult  mechanical  pro- 
blem could  hardly,  I  think,  be  proposed,  than  to  discover  a  method  of  con- 
stantly repairing  the  waste,  and  of  supplying  an  accession  of  substance  to 
every  part  of  a  complicated  machine  at  the  same  time. 

"  This  system  presents  itself  under  two  views :  first,  the  disposition  of  the 
blood-vessels,  i.e.,  the  laying  of  the  pipes;  and,  secondly,  the  construction 
of  the  engine  at  the  centre — viz.,  the  heart,  for  driving  the  blood  through 
them." 

Exposition. — All  Paley's  works  became  popular  standards,  and 
his  '  Evidences '  and  '  Natural  Theology '  have  not  yet  been  super- 
seded. No  writer  has  surpassed  him  in  popularising  the  subjects 


WILLIAM  PALEY.  501 

• 

that  he  treated  of.  He  may  not  rank  high  as  an  original  thinker; 
but  as  a  popular  expositor  he  may  still  be  said  to  be  "the  first  of 
the  first  rank."  The  fact  that  he  is  far  from  perfect  even  in  that 
capacity,  should  be  an  inducement  for  authors  of  kindred  genius 
to  surpass  him,  or  at  least  to  bring  similar  subjects  up  to  the  level 
of  more  recent  thought 

We  have  seen  that  his  great  art  of  exposition  is  the  production 
of  homely  examples  and  comparisons.  This  appears  in  every 
extract  that  we  have  considered,  and  needs  not  be  farther  enlarged 
upon.  It  needs  only  be  remarked,  that  trusting  to  this  way  of 
making  himself  intelligible,  he  is  not  always  so  careful  as  he 
might  be  in  his  general  statements. 

He  does  not  often  repeat  a  statement,  either  directly  or  ob- 
versely.  His  ideal  seems  to  be  to  give  a  single  statement,  and 
then  follow  up  with  one  or  more  illustrations,  as  the  case  may 
require. 

Of  course,  his  power  of  homely  illustration  would  not  have  in- 
sured his  popularity  as  the  expounder  of  a  technical  subject  had 
he  not  been  so  orderly  and  methodical,  and  had  he  not  avoided 
the  most  abstruse  inquiries. 

Over  and  above  all  this,  he  must  also  have  possessed  some  means 
of  imparting  popular  interest.  Putting  aside  the  intrinsic  interest 
of  the  subjects,  which  must  always  be  supposed  in  a  popular  work, 
we  can  see  little  in  Paley's  manner  of  exposition  to  attract  interest 
except  its  simplicity,  and  its  contrast  in  that  respect  to  other  works 
on  the  same  subjects.  When  we  wish  to  know  something  of  a 
subject,  and  can  find  nothing  but  dry,  abstruse  expositions,  it  is 
a  great  pleasure  to  meet  with  an  instructor  that  sympathises  with 
our  difficulties,  and  is  studiously  careful  to  make  the  path  of 
knowledge  easy.  Such  an  instructor  is  Paley.  Take,  for  ex- 
ample, his  most  technical  work,  the  '  Moral  and  Political  Phil- 
osophy.' Instead  of  scaring  us  in  the  Preface  with  a  parade  of 
the  difficulties  of  the  subject,  and  apologies  for  his  temerity  in  un- 
dertaking such  a  task,  he  understates  the  difficulties,  and  takes  the 
task  upon  him  with  easy  confidence.  We  are  told  that  the  design 
of  the  work  is  to  "  direct  private  consciences  in  the  general  conduct 
of  human  life,"  "  to  instruct  individuals  in  their  duty."  There  is 
not  a  hint  of  any  perplexity  about  what  "  conscience  "  is,  or  what 
"  duty "  is.  The  discussion  of  the  difficult  points,  such  as  the 
Moral  Sense,  is  managed  with  such  consummate  simplicity,  that 
we  read  the  work  through  as  a  shrewd  body  of  good  advice,  and 
wonder  how  there  could  be  so  much  hot  controversy  about  questions 
so  plain.  Our  conductor  never  indicates,  by  any  faltering  in  his 
tone,  that  he  is  in  any  difficulty.  When  he  starts  a  subject  on 
which  moralists  have  shown  a  perplexing  difference  of  opinion,  he 
confidently  assures  us  that  the  differences  are  more  in  name  than 


502  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

p 

in  reality.  It  is  refreshing  to  turn  to  the  Book  on  '  Moral  Obli- 
gations,' and  find  the  first  chapter — which  is  headed,  "  The  Ques- 
tion, Why  am  I  obliged  to  keep  my  word,  considered  " — effect  such 
an  easy  reconciliation  of  conflicting  views : — 

"  Why  am  I  obliged  to  keep  my  word  ! 

"  Because  it  is  right,  says  one. — Because  it  is  agreeable  to  the  fitness  of 
things,  says  another. — Because  it  is  conformable  to  reason  and  nature,  says 
a  third. — Because  it  is  conformable  to  truth,  says  a  fourth. — Because  it 
promotes  the  public  good,  says  a  fifth. — Because  it  is  required  by  the  will 
of  God,  concludes  a  sixth. 

"Upon  which  dili'erent  accounts,  two  things  are  observable  : — 

"FiRST,  that  they  all  ultimately  coincide. 

"The  fitness  of  things,  means  their  fitness  to  produce  happiness:  the 
nature  of  things,  means  that  actual  constitution  of  the  world,  by  which 
some  things,  as  such  and  such  actions,  for  example,  produce  happiness, 
and  others  misery  ;  reason  is  the  principle  by  which  we  discover  or  judge 
of  this  constitution :  truth  is  this  judgment,  expressed  or  drawn  out  into 
propositions." 

Persuasion. — As  might  be  inferred  from  what  we  have  said, 
Paley  is  much  more  successful  in  convincing  the  reason  than  in 
captivating  the  fancy  or  touching  the  feelings.  As  a  preacher  he 
is  "  moderate  "  and  "  rationalistic,"  insisting  much  upon  the  pru- 
dence of  living  in  accordance  with  the  Christian  faith.  He  excels 
more  as  a  controversial  writer.  His  fairness  and  clear  good  sense 
always  produce  a  favourable  impression ;  and  in  his  steady  way  of 
going  to  work,  he  gives  a  succinct  presentation  of  an  opponent's 
arguments  before  proceeding  to  state  his  case  in  reply.  The 
'  Evidences '  are  generally  allowed  to  be  nearly  exhaustive  from 
their  particular  point  of  view,  and  in  the  '  Natural  Theology '  he 
makes  the  most  of  his  knowledge. 

He  shines  especially  in  refutation.  He  was  perhaps  hardly 
energetic  enough  to  show  much  original  ingenuity  in  discovering 
arguments.  His  power  in  what  may  be  called  "  constructive " 
argument  lay  rather  in  effective  statement  and  arrangement,  and 
in  the  elaborate  filling-out  of  the  skeleton-ideas  of  others.  It  is 
in  refutation,  in  "  destructive  "  argument,  that  he  appears  to  most 
advantage.  He  lias  a  mercilessly  steady  eye  for  inconsistency ; 
and,  from  his  habit  of  referring  every  general  statement  to  its 
basis  of  facts,  often  makes  short  work  of  very  specious  generalities. 

His  power  lies  most  conspicuously  in  the  happy  use  of  particular 
facts  to  demolish  groundless  generalities.  In  this  way,  for  ex- 
ample, he  conclusively  exposes  the  commonplace  outcry  against 
theoretical  politicians,  which  has  been  taken  up  even  by  such  men 
as  Macaulay : — 

"  I  am  not  ignorant  of  an  objection  that  has  been  advanced  against  all 
abstract/  speculations  concerning  the  origin,  principle,  or  limitation  of  civil 
authority — namely,  that  such  speculations  possess  little  or  no  influence  upon 


WILLIAM  PALEY.  503 

the  conduct  either  of  the  State  or  of  the  subjects,  of  the  governors  or  the 
governed,  nor  are  attended  with  any  useful  consequences  to  either  ;  that  in 
times  of  tranquillity  they  are  not  wanted  ;  in  times  of  confusion  they  are 
never  heard.  This  representation,  however,  in  my  opinion,  is  not  just 
Times  of  tumult,  it  is  true,  are  not  the  times  to  learn  ;  but  the  choice  which 
men  make  of  their  side  and  party,  in  the  most  critical  occasions  of  the 
commonwealth,  may  nevertheless  depend  upon  the  lessons  they  have  re- 
ceived, the  books  they  have  read,  and  the  opinions  they  have  imbibed,  in 
seasons  of  leisure  and  quietness.  Some  judicious  persons,  who  were  present 
at  Geneva  during  the  troubles  which  lately  convulsed  that  city,  thought 
they  perceived,  in  the  contentious  there  carrying  on,  the  operation  of  that 
political  theory  which  the  writings  of  Rousseau,  and  the  unbounded  esteem 
in  which  these  writings  are  holden  by  his  countrymen,  had  diffused  among 
the  people.  Throughout  the  political  disputes  that  have  within  these  few 
years  taken  place  in  Great  Britain,  in  her  sister  kingdom,  and  in  her  foreign 
dependencies,  it  was  impossible  not  to  observe,  in  the  language  of  party,  in 
the  resolutions  of  public  meetings,  in  debate,  in  conversation,  in  the  general 
strain  of  those  fugitive  and  diurnal  addresses  to  the  public  which  such  occa- 
sions call  forth,  the  prevalency  of  those  ideas  of  civil  authority,  which  are 
displayed  in  the  works  of  Mr  Locke." 

He  was  not  the  man  to  rush  into  every  controversy  affecting  the 
Church  ;  but,  once  aroused,  he  was  au  able  champion  of  his  causa 
His  paper  on  '  Subscription  to  Articles  of  Faith,'  written  in  defence 
of  his  patron,  Bishop  Law,  against  some  animadversions,  is  a  model 
of  cool  and  thorough  refutation.  An  extract  or  two  will  show  how 
vigorously  he  argues,  and  how  carefully  he  has  mastered  his  op- 
ponent's positions : — 

"  The  author  of  the  '  Considerations '  "  (the  title  of  Bishop  Law's  work) 
"contends  very  properly  that  it  is  one  of  the  first  duties  a  Christian  owes  to 
his  Master  'to  keep  his  mind  open  and  unbiassed'  in  religious  inquiries. 
Can  a  man  be  said  to  do  this  who  must  bring  himself  to  assent  to  opinions 
proposed  by  another  ?  who  enters  into  a  profession  where  both  his  subsis- 
tence and  success  depend  upon  his  continuance  in  a  particular  persuasion  ? 
In  answer  to  this  we  are  informed  that  these  articles  are  no  '  rule  of  faith  ' 
(what !  not  to  those  who  subscribe  them?) ;  that  'the  Church  deprives  no 
man  of  his  right  of  private  judgment '  (she  cannot ;  she  hangs,  however,  a 
dead  weight  upon  it) ;  that  it  is  'a  very  unfair  state  of  the  case  to  call  sub- 
scription a  declaration  of  our  full  and  final  persuasion  in  matters  of  faith  ; 
though  if  it  be  not  a  '  full '  persuasion,  what  is  it  ?  and  ten  to  one  it  will  be 
'  final,'  when  such  consequences  attend  a  change.  That  'no  man  is  hereby 
tied  up  from  impartially  examining  the  Word  of  God, '  i. e. ,  with  the  '  impar- 
tiality' of  a  man  who  must  'eat*  or  'starve,'  according  as  the  examination 
turns  out ;  an  '  impartiality '  so  suspected  that  a  court  of  justice  would  not 
receive  his  evidence  under  half  of  the  same  influence  :  nor  from  altering  his 
opinion  if  he  finds  reason  so  to  do  ;  which  few,  I  conceive,  will  find,  when 
the  alteration  must  cost  them  so  dear.  If  one  could  give  credit  to  our  author 
in  what  he  says  here,  and  in  some  other  passages  of  his  Answer,  one  would 
suppose  that,  in  his  judgment  at  least,  subscription  restrained  no  man  from 
adopting  what  opinion  he  pleased,  provided  '  he  does  not  think  himself 
bound  openly  to  maintain  it ;'  that  'men  may  retain  their  preferments,  if 
they  will  but  keep  their  opinions  to  themselves. '  If  this  be  what  the  Church 
of  England  means,  let  her  say  so. 

"  It  seemed  to  add  strength  to  this  objection  that  the  judgment  of  most 


504  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

thinking  men,  being  in  a  progressive  state,  their  opinions  of  course  must 
many  of  them  change ;  the  evil  «nd  iniquity  of  which  the  answerer  sets  forth 
with  great  pleasantry,  but  has  forgot  at  the  same  time  to  give  us  any  remedy 
for  the  misfortune,  except  the  old  woman's  receipt,  to  leave  off  thinking  for 
fear  of  thinking  wrong. 

"Our  author,  good  man,  'is  well  persuaded  that  the  generality  of  the 
clergy,  when  they  offer  themselves  for  ordination,  consider  seriously  what 
office  they  take  upon  them,  and  firmly  believe  what  they  subscribe  to.'  I 
arn  persuaded  much  otherwise.  But  as  this  is  a  '  fact, '  the  reader,  if  he  be 
wise,  will  neither  take  the  answerer's  word  for  it  nor  mine,  but  form  his 
own  judgment  from  his  own  observation.  Bishop  Burnet  complained  above 
sixty  years  ago,  that  'the  greater  part,'  even  then,  '  subscribed  the  Articles 
without  ever  examining  them,  and  others  did  it  because  they  must  do  it. ' 
Is  it  probable  that,  in  point  either  of  seriousness  or  orthodoxy,  the  clergy 
have  much  mended  since  ?  " 

ROBERT    HALL,    1764-183L 

One  of  the  most  eminent  preachers  of  his  generation,  if  not  the 
most  eminent.  He  was  the  son  of  a  Baptist  minister  at  Arnsby, 
near  Leicester,  the  youngest  of  fourteen  children.  He  seems  to 
have  been  a  very  precocious  boy :  he  is  related  to  have  been  a  great 
talker  at  the  age  of  three,  to  have  told  amusing  stories  at  six,  to 
have  studied  Butler's  '  Analogy '  and  Jonathan  Edwards  '  On  the 
Will '  at  nine,  and  to  have  learnt  all  that  his  schoolmaster  could 
teach  him  at  eleven.  He  received  his  higher  education  at  a  Baptist 
academy  in  Bristol,  and  at  King's  College,  Aberdeen,  where  he 
passed  through  the  regular  course  of  study  and  took  the  degree  of 
M.A.  At  Aberdeen  he  was  the  class-fellow  and  intimate  com- 
panion of  Sir  James  Mackintosh — the  two  young  men  often  walk- 
ing together  and  debating  questions  in  metaphysics  and  general 
literature.  For  five  years  he  officiated  at  Broadmead,  near  Bristol, 
as  assistant-minister  to  a  Baptist  congregation,  acting  at  the  same 
time  as  classical  tutor  in  the  Baptist  Academy.  In  1790  he  re- 
ceived a  call  from  a  congregation  in  Cambridge,  and  remained 
there  for  fifteen  years,  acquiring  great  fame  as  a  preacher.  While 
there  he  published  some  tracts  and  sermons, — '  Christianity  Con- 
sistent with  the  Love  of  Freedom '  (1791) ;  'Apology  for  the  Free- 
dom of  the  Press'  (1793);  'Modern  Infidelity  considered  with 
respect  to  its  Influence  on  Society'  (1799);  'Reflections  on  War' 
(1802);  'The  Sentiments  Proper  to  the  Present  Crisis'  (1803). 
What  with  hard  study,  and  what  with  the  excitement  of  preach- 
ing and  talking,  he  overtaxed  his  strength :  in  1804,  and  again  in 
1805,  he  had  an  attack  of  insanity.  When  his  health  was  re- 
established, he  became  associated  with  a  congregation  in  Leicester, 
and  preached  there  with  such  acceptance  that  the  church  had  to  be 
enlarged.  He  remained  at  Leicester  for  nearly  twenty  years.  In 
1826  he  removed  to  Bristol,  upon  an  invitation  from  the  church 
where  he  had  been  assistant  nearly  forty  years  befora  He  died  at 


EGBERT  HALL.  505 

Bristol  in  1831.  His  collected  works,  edited  with  a  Life  by  Dr 
Olinthus  Gregory,  contain  the  pieces  above  mentioned ;  two  small 
volumes  of  sermons  (among  which  may  be  singled  out  the  '  Funeral 
Sermon  for  the  Princess  Charlotte,'  and  'The  Glory  of  God  in 
Concealing');  'Terms  of  Communion'  (an  attempt  to  promote 
free  communion  among  Christian  Churches);  and  other  pieces 
of  minor  importance. 

Hall  had  a  large-built,  robust-looking  figure.  When  in  repose, 
his  features  wore  a  stern  expression,  his  large  mouth  having  a 
peculiarly  formidable  appearance ;  but  when  he  was  engaged  in 
friendly  talk,  the  lines  were  soft  and  winning. 

With  so  much  of  the  appearance  of  robust  health,  his  consti- 
tution was  far  from  being  strong  in  'all  its  parts.  All  his  life 
through  he  suffered  from  acute  pains  in  the  side  and  loins ;  and 
when  he  died,  the  cause  of  his  sufferings  was  found  to  be  exten- 
sive disease  of  the  heart  and  the  right  kidney.  The  other  vital 
organs  were  found  to  be  quite  healthy ;  and  this  probably  explains 
why  he  was  able  to  endure  his  acute  pains  so  long,  and  to  enjoy 
life,  to  maintain  even  a  buoyant  flow  of  spirits,  in  the  intervals  of 
the  keener  paroxysms.  He  supported  nature  further  by  large 
doses  of  stimulants  and  narcotics,  drinking  enormous  quantities 
of  tea  (as  many  as  thirty  cups  in  an  afternoon),  smoking  hard,  and 
in  his  later  years,  when  his  pains  increased,  taking  as  much  as  a 
thousand  drops  of  laudanum  in  a  night 

.  As  in  the  case  of  Johnson,  still  more  in  the  case  of  Hall,  it  would 
be  unfair  to  estimate  his  intellectual  powers  by  his  published  writ- 
ings. These  contain  much  clear  and  vigorous  argument,  copious- 
ness of  expression,  and  here  and  there  passages  of  splendid 
declamation ;  but  they  do  not  bear  out  the  reputation  he  held 
among  his  contemporaries,  both  in  his  peculiar  brotherhood  and 
out  of  it.  He  never  concentrated  his  powers  long  upon  any  one 
theme.  He  was  very  unlike  the  steady,  sagacious  Paley,  who 
threw  the  greater  part  of  his  energy  into  his  books.  He  was  ready 
to  spend  himself  upon  "  labour  that  profiteth  not,"  at  least  for 
posthumous  reputation.  He  went  through  a  laborious  course  of 
reading  in  Latin  and  Greek  authors,  "  because  he  thought  himself 
especially  defective  in  a  tasteful  and  critical  acquaintance  with 
them  ; "  sparing  not  even  "  the  best  treatises  on  the  Greek  metres 
then  extant."  He  went  through  a  similarly  laborious  course  of 
reading  in  mathematics,  in  order  to  comprehend  Sir  Isaac  New- 
ton's philosophical  discoveries.  When  Macaulay  wrote  his  cele- 
brated article  on  Milton,  Hall  set  to  work  at  Italian,  that  he 
might  be  able  to  verify  the  comparison  between  Milton  and  Dante. 
A  man  so  discursive  could  not  be  expected  to  write  much  at  a  high 
standard  of  excellence.  Nearly  all  his  published  writings  were 
composed  rather  hastily.  He  prepared  only  one  or  two  of  hia 


606  FROM    1790  TO   1820. 

sermons  for  publication :  most  of  them  were  published  after  his 
death  from  notes  taken  by  hearers.  The  intellectual  power  dis- 
played in  what  he  has  written  is  very  unequal ;  but  there  are 
passages  that  show  us  what  he  was  capable  of,  and  entitle  him 
to  a  high  rank  in  literature. 

Like  Jeremy  Taylor,  Hall  was  at  once  a  hard  student  and  a 
man  of  warm  feelings.  He  had,  as  we  have  said,  in  spite  of  all 
his  acute  sufferings,  a  keen  enjoyment  of  life.  He  said  of  himself 
that  he  "  enjoyed  everything."  He  liked  company  extremely — 
"Don't  let  us  go  yet,"  he  was  often  heard  to  say;  "the  present 
place  is  the  best  place."  He  took  pleasure  in  the  dry  treatises  of 
Jonathan  Edwards,  and  spoke  with  enthusiasm  of  Chillingworth's 
'  Religion  of  Protestants '— -"  It  is  just,"  he  said,  "  like  reading  a 
novel."  His  likes,  dislikes,  and  admirations  were  numerous,  and  ex- 
pressed with  vehemence.  In  argument  he  was  excitable,  and  often 
lost  his  temper  :  when  his  companions  differed  from  him  on  a  point 
that  he  had  considered  well,  he  closed  the  debate  with  a  peremp- 
tory deliverance  of  his  opinion.  When  excited,  he  indulged  freely 
in  personal  sarcasms.  In  genial  company  he  was  the  gayest  of 
companions  ;  uttering  his  opinions  without  reserve,  playing  on  his 
friends  with  affectionate  raillery,  and  showing  a  grateful  sense  of 
the  regard  paid  to  his  talents.  With  unaffected  piety  he  often  took 
himself  to  task  for  not  making  his  conversation  more  spiritually 
edifying,  and  made  good  resolutions  to  amend ;  but  though  he 
entered  a  company  with  the  best  intentions,  his  genial  impulses 
were  too  strong. 

For  active  life  he  was  eminently  unqualified.  He  was  tolerably 
methodical  in  his  studies,  and  there  is  no  record  of  his  being 
diverted  by  other  interests  from  the  due  preparation  of  his  weekly 
discourses.  But  in  the  matter  of  active  duties  he  needed  constant 
supervision.  He  became  absorbed  in  his  books,  and  forgot  his 
engagements.  His  deacons  often  had  to  look  for  him  in  his  study. 
He  was  sometimes  ignorant  of  the  day  of  the  week :  and  if  he 
went  to  London,  and  engaged  to  deliver  letters  for  his  friends,  the 
chances  were  that  he  brought  them  back  in  his  pocket 

Opinions. — Hall  caused  some  suspicion  and  anxiety  among  his 
graver  brethren  by  the  liberality  of  his  views,  and  his  free  remarks 
on  names  venerable  in  the  Church.  There  was  no  moroseness,  no 
austerity,  in  his  religious  opinions :  as  we  have  seen,  he  was  by 
nature  lively  and  full  of  gay  spirits.  He  was  latitudinariun  in 
his  views  of  Church  government,  inclining  to  Pope's  epigram, 
"Whate'er  is  best  administered  is  best."  In  his  'Terms  of  Com- 
munion,' he  advocated  tlie  admission  of  every  denomination  of 
Christians  to  the  communion-tables  of  every  other.  There  his  in- 
dulgence stopped.  He  had  Johnson's  hatred  of  infidelity  and  infidels. 


ROBERT   HALL.  507 

He  wrote  with  great  spirit  against  ecclesiastical  and  political 
intolerance  to  Dissenters. 

He  took  little  part  in  political  controversies.  His  first  work, 
'  Christianity  consistent  with  a  Love  of  Freedom,'  was  designed 
to  vindicate  the  exertions  of  Christian  ministers  in  the  cause  of 
political  freedom ;  but  though  he  defended  the  principle,  he  him- 
self ha-1  no  natural  turn  for  the  work.  In  his  'Apology  for  the 
Freedom  of  the  Press  and  for  General  Liberty,'  he  appears  as  one 
of  the  earliest  advocates  for  Parliamentary  Reform. 

ELEMENTS   OP   STYLE. 

Vocabulary. — His  command  of  language  is  sufficiently  copious, 
though  not  by  any  means  of  the  first  order.  This  is  perhaps  due 
in  no  small  measure  to  the  course  of  his  reading.  He  spent  com- 
paratively little  time  upon  the  masters  of  the  English  language. 
His  favourite  authors  were  the  writers  of  systematic  and  contro- 
rersial  theology  and  metaphysics.  From  this  circumstance  his 
command  of  the  great  popular  body  of  the  language  is  limited  in 
comparison  with  what  might  be  expected  with  his  powers  of  verbal 
memory.  And  from  the  same  circumstance  his  diction  is  Latin- 
ised and  heavily  encumbered  with  the  technical  phrases  of  argu- 
mentation. 

Sentences. — In  the  structure  of  his  sentences  he  is  a  close  imita- 
tor of  Johnson.  He  acknowledged  that  in  his  youth  he  "aped 
Johnson,  and  preached  Johnson,"  but  said  that  he  found  the 
diction  too  cumbrous,  and  abandoned  all  attempts  to  make  it  a 
modeL  His  sentences,  however,  although  shorter,  bear  unmis- 
takable traces  of  Johnson.  He  has  not  the  same  abrupt  way  of 
introducing  generalities,  but  he  imitates  all  the  arts  of  balance, 
from  the  ponderous  swing  to  the  sharp  emphatic  point. 

QUALITIES   OF   STYLE. 

Simplicity. — Hall's  diction  is  not  suited  for  a  popular  style. 
Not  only  does  it  want  pictorial  embellishments,  except  in  the 
more  highly  wrought  passages :  it  is  positively  dry ;  he  has  a 
preference  for  heavy  Latin  derivatives,  and  for  abstract  forms  of 
expression — the  result,  as  we  have  said,  in  some  measure,  of  his 
favourite  studies.  Such  expressions  as — "  The  author  knows  not 
with  certainty  to  whom  to  ascribe  it  He  believes  it  fell  from  the 
pen  of  an  illustrious  female,  Mrs  More" — belong  to  a  stilted  order 
of  composition  very  shocking  to  modern  advocates  of  the  Queen's 
English.  Apart  from  the  occasional  use  of  stilted  and  unfamiliar 
words,  the  general  cast  of  the  expression  is  excessively  abstract. 
Any  passage  will  illustrate  this  :  let  us  take  (from  the  '  Sentiments 


508  FKOM   17'JO  TO   1820. 

proper  to  the  Present  Crisis')  some  remarks  upon  our  reasons  for 
expecting  to  be  victorious  over  the  French  : — 

"  They  appear  to  entertain  mistaken  sentiments,  who  rely  with  too  much 
confidence  for  success  on  our  supposed  superiority  in  virtue  to  our  enemies. 
Such  a  confidence  betrays  inattention  to  the  actual  conduct  of  Providence. 
Wherever  there  is  conscious  guilt,  there  is  room  to  apprehend  punishment ; 
nor  is  it  for  the  criminal  to  decide  where  the  merited  punishment  shall  first 
fall.  The  cup  of  divine  displeasure  is,  indeed,  presented  successively  to 
guilty  nations,  but  it  by  no  means  invariably  begins  with  those  who  have 
run  the  greatest  career  in  guilt.  On  the  contrary,  'judgment  often  begins 
at  the  house  of  God ; '  and  He  frequently  chastises  His  servants  with  severity 
before  He  proceeds  to  the  destruction  of  His  enemies.  He  assured  Abraham 
his  seed  should  be  afflicted  in  Egypt  for  four  hundred  years,  and  that  after 
their  expiration,  '  the  nation  that  afflicted  them  he  would  judge.' " 

There  is  undeniably  a  certain  dignity  in  this  mode  of  expres- 
sion, but  it  is  very  much  unsuited  to  the  easy  apprehension  of 
people  generally.  A  simple  writer  would  probably  prefer  some 
such  beginning  as  this  : — 

"We  do  wrong  to  trust  in  our  being  more  virtuous  than  our  enemies. 
Even  though  we  are  more  virtuous,  that  is  no  reason  for  believing  that  Pro- 
vidence, in  the  first  instance  at  least,  will  fight  on  our  side.  We  may  be 
better  than  our  enemies,  yet  we  cannot  pretend  to  be  perfect :  if  we  are 
guilty,  we  deserve  to  be  punished,  and  we  have  no  right  to  complain  if  we 
ore  punished  before  others  more  guilty  than  ourselves.  Consider  the  deal- 
ings of  Providence  in  past  times.  Have  the  most  wicked  nations  always 
l«en  the  first  to  receive  punishment?  No;  on  the  contrary,  'judgment 
often  begins  at  the  house  of  God,'"&c. 

Clearness. — Hall's  mind  had  a  natural  craving  for  broad  com- 
prehensive views,  and  he  usually  states  his  case  with  great  per- 
spicuity. His  pursuit  of  abstract  argumentative  literature  also, 
while  it  confirmed  him  in  the  use  of  unfamiliar  language,  accus- 
tomed him  to  a  certain  exactness  of  expression.  In  his  contro- 
versial works  he  makes  copious  use  of  logical  formalities,  and 
gives  evidence  of  a  concentrated  effort  to  be  clear  in  his  phrases 
of  reference  and  in  the  general  conduct  of  his  discourse,  as  well 
as  precise  and  discriminate  in  the  employment  of  doubtful  terms. 

Strength. — The  distinguishing  excellence  of  Hall's  style  consists 
in  general  vigour  and  elevation  of  language.  His  astonishing 
popularity  was  probably  due  to  the  occasional  bursts  of  splendid 
eloquence. 

His  '  Apology  for  the  Freedom  of  the  Press '  is  written  with 
great  spirit  The  following  bears  out  what  we  say  as  regards 
general  vigour  and  elevation : — 

"  Between  the  period  of  national  honour  and  complete  degeneracy,  there 
is  usually  an  interval  of  national  vanity,  during  which  examples  of  virtue 
are  recounted  and  admired  without  being  imitated.  The  Romans  were 
never  more  proud  of  their  ancestors  than  wheu  they  ceased  to  resemble 


ROBERT   HALL.  509 

them.  From  being  the  freest  and  most  high-spirited  people  in  the  woriu, 
they  suddenly  fell  into  the  tamest  and  most  abject  submission.  Let  Hot 
the  name  of  Britons,  my  countrymen,  too  much  elate  you  ;  nor  even  think 
yourselves  safe  while  you  abate  one  jot  of  that  holy  jealousy  by  which  your 
liberties  have  hitherto  been  secured.  The  richer  the  inheritance  bequeathed 
you,  the  more  it  merits  your  care  for  its  preservation.  The  possession  must 
be  continued  by  that  spirit  with  which  it  was  at  first  acquired ;  and  as  it 
was  gained  by  vigilance,  it  will  be  lost  by  supineness.  A  degenerate  race 
repose  on  the  merits  of  their  forefathers  ;  the  virtuous  create  a  fund  of  their 
own.  The  former  look  back  to  their  ancestors  to  hide  their  shame ;  the 
latter  look  forward  to  posterity,  to  levy  a  tribute  of  admiration.  In  vain 
will  you  confide  in  the  forms  of  a  free  constitution.  Unless  you  reanimate 
these  forms  with  fresh  vigour,  they  will  be  melancholy  memorials  of  what 
you  once  were,  and  haunt  you  with  the  shade  of  departed  liberty.  A  silent 
stream  of  corruption  poured  over  the  whole  land,  has  tainted  every  branch 
of  the  administration  with  decay.  On  your  temperate  but  manly  exertions 
depend  the  happiness  and  freedom  of  th«  latest  posterity.  That  Assembly 
which  sits  by  right  of  representation,  will  be  little  inclined  to  oppose  your 
will,  expressed  in  a  firm,  decisive  manner.  You  may  be  deafened  by 
clamour,  misled  by  sophistry,  or  weakened  by  division,  but  you  cannot  be 
despised  with  impunity.  A  vindictive  ministry  may  hang  the  terrors  of 
criminal  prosecution  over  the  heads  of  a  few  with  success  ;  but  at  their  peril 
will  they  attempt  to  intimidate  a  nation.  The  trick  of  associations,  of  pre- 
tended plots,  and  silent  insurrections,  will  oppose  a  feeble  barrier  to  the 
impression  of  the  popular  mind." 

The  concluding  expression  is  an  example  of  our  author's  peculiar 
failing,  the  introduction  here  and  there  of  an  incongruous  mean- 
ness of  expression,  of  a  word  or  phrase  out  of  tune  as  it  were. 
"  The  impression  of  the  popular  mind "  is  a  feeble  ending ;  "  tJie 
will  of  a  whole  people"  or  some  such  phrase,  would  have  been 
more  in  keeping.  These  occasional  lapses  are  probably  the  results 
of  his  chronic  malady ;  when  an  acute  paroxysm  came  upon  him, 
he  mu&t  often  have  ended  otf  a  sentence  with  the  first  form  that 
occurred,  having  no  patience  to  see  that  it  harmonised. 

A  good  example  of  his  loftiest  flights  is  the  animated  address  at 
the  close  of '  Sentiments  proper  to  the  Present  Crisis.'  The  passage 
is  often  quoted  : — 

"  By  a  series  of  criminal  enterprises,  by  the  successes  of  guilty  ambition, 
the  liberties  of  Europe  have  been  gradually  extinguished :  the  subjugation 
of  Holland,  Switzerland,  and  the  free  towns  of  Germany,  has  completed  that 
catastrophe  ;  and  we  are  the  only  people  in  the  eastern  hemisphere  who  are 
in  possession  of  equal  laws  and  a  free  constitution.  Freedom,  driven  from 
every  spot  on  the  Continent,  has  sought  an  asylum  in  a  country  which  she 
always  chose  for  her  favourite  abode  ;  but  she  is  pursued  even  here,  and 
threatened  with  destruction.  The  inundation  of  lawless  power,  after  cover- 
ing the  whole  earth,  threatens  to  follow  us  here  ;  and  we  are  most  exactly, 
most  critically  placed,  in  the  only  aperture  where  it  can  be  successfully  re- 
pelled, in  the  Thermopylae  of  the  universe.  As  far  as  the  interests  of  free- 
dom are  concerned,  the  most  important  by  far  of  sublunary  interests,  you, 
my  countrymen,  stand  in  the  capacity  of  the  federal  representatives  of  the 
human  race  ;  for  with  you  it  is  to  determine  (under  God)  in  what  condition 
tiie  latest  posterity  shall  be  born  j  their  fortunes  are  entrusted  to  your  care, 


510  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

and  on  your  conduct  at  this  moment  depends  the  colour  and  complexion  of 
their  destiny.  If  liberty,  after  being  extinguished  on  the  Continent,  is 
suffered  to  expire  here,  whence  is  it  ever  to  emerge  in  the  midst  of  that 
thick  night  that  will  invest  it  ?  It  remains  with  you  then  to  decide  whether 
that  freedom,  at  whose  voice  the  kingdoms  of  Europe  awoke  from  the  sleep 
of  ages,  to  run  a  career  of  virtuous  emulation  in  everything  great  and  good  ; 
the  freedom  which  dispelled  the  mists  of  superstition,  and  invited  the 
nations  to  behold  their  God  ;  whose  magic  touch  kindled  the  rays  of  genius, 
the  enthusiasm  of  poetry,  and  the  flame  of  eloquence  ;  the  freedom  which 
poured  into  our  lap  opulence  and  arts,  and  embellished  life  with  innumer- 
able institutions  and  improvements,  till  it  became  a  theatre  of  wonders  ;  it 
is  for  you  to  decide  whether  this  freedom  shall  yet  survive,  or  be  covered 
with  a  funeral  pall,  and  wrapt  in  eternal  gloom.  It  is  not  necessary  to  await 
your  determination.  In  the  solicitude  you  feel  to  approve  yourselves  worthy 
of  such  a  trust,  every  thought  of  what  is  afflicting  in  warfare,  every  appre- 
hension of  danger  must  vanish,  and  you  are  impatient  to  mingle  in  the 
battles  of  the  civilised  world.  Go,  then,  ye  defenders  of  your  country, 
accompanied  with  every  auspicious  omen ;  advance  with  alacrity  into  the 
fiold,  where  God  Himself  musters  the  hosts  to  war.  Religion  is  too  much 
interested  in  your  success  not  to  lend  you  her  aid  ;  she  will  shed  over  this 
enterprise  her  selectest  influence.  While  you  are  engaged  in  the  field,  many 
will  repair  to  the  closet,  many  to  the  sanctuary ;  the  faithful  of  every  name 
will  employ  that  prayer  which  has  power  with  God  ;  the  feeble  hands  which 
are  unequal  to  any  other  weapon  will  grasp  the  sword  of  the  Spirit ;  and 
from  myriads  of  humble,  contrite  hearts,  the  voice  of  intercession,  supplica- 
tion, and  weeping,  will  mingle  in  its  ascent  to  heaven  with  the  shouts  of 
battle  and  the  shock  of  arms. 

The  continuation  of  this  passage,  which  is  not  so  often  quoted, 
exhibits  no  falling  off  of  power.  There  is  not  perhaps  in  the 
whole  range  of  oratory  anything  more  inspiring  than  the  con- 
cluding invocations : — 

"  While  you  have  everything  to  fear  from  the  success  of  the  enemy,  you 
have  every  means  of  preventing  that  success,  so  that  it  is  next  to  impossible 
for  victory  not  to  crown  your  exertions.  The  extent  of  your  resources,  under 
God,  is  equal  to  the  justice  of  your  cause.  But  should  Providence  deter- 
mine otherwise,  should  you  fall  in  this  struggle,  should  the  nation  fall,  you 
will  have  the  satisfaction  (the  purest  allotted  to  man)  of  having  performed 
your  part ;  your  names  will  be  enrolled  with  the  most  illustrious  dead; 
while  posterity,  to  the  end  of  time,  as  often  as  they  revolve  the  events  of 
this  period  (and  they  will  incessantly  revolve  them),  will  turn  to  you  a 
reverential  eye,  while  they  mourn  over  the  freedom  which  is  entombed  in 
your  sepulchre.  I  cannot  but  imagine  the  virtuous  heroes,  legislators,  and 
patriots,  of  every  age  and  country,  are  bending  from  their  elevated  seats  to 
witness  this  contest,  as  if  they  were  incapable,  till  it  be  brought  to  a  favour- 
able issue,  of  enjoying  their  eternal  repose.  Enjoy  that  repose,  illustrious 
immortals  !  Your  mantle  fell  when  you  ascended  ;  and  thousands  inflamed 
with  your  spirit,  and  impatient  to  tread  in  your  steps,  are  ready  to  swear  by 
Him  that  sitLeth  upon  the  throne,  and  livethfor  ever  and  ever,  they  will  pro- 
tect freedom 'in  her  last  asylum,  and  never  desert  that  cause  which  you 
sustained  by  your  labours,  and  cemented  with  your  blood.  And  thou,  sole 
Kuler  among  the  children  ot  men,  to  whom  the  shields  of  the  earth  belong, 
gird  on  thy  sword,  thou  Most  Mighty :  go  forth  with  our  hosts  in  the  day  of 
battle  1  Impart,  in  addition  to  their  hereditary  valour,  that  confidence  of 


ROBERT  HALL.  511 

success  which  springs  from  thy  presence  !  Pour  into  their  hearts  the  spirit 
of  depnrted  heroes  !  Inspire  them  with  thine  owu  ;  and  while  led  by  thine 
hand,  and  fighting  under  thy  banners,  open  thou  their  eyes  to  behold  in 
every  valley  and  in  every  plain,  what  thy  prophet  beheld  by  the  same 
illumination — chariots  of  fire  and  horses  of  fire  !  Then  shall  the  strong  man 
be  as  tow,  and  the  maker  of  it  as  a  spark  ;  and  they  shall  both  burn  together, 
and  none  shall  quench  them. " 

In  the  Funeral  Sermon  for  the  Princess  Charlotte  there  are 
several  soaring  passages.  The  following  is  one  of  the  most 
striking : — 

"What,  my  brethren,  if  it  be  lawful  to  indulge  such  a  thought,  what 
would  be  the  funeral  obsequies  of  a  lost  soul  ?  Where  shall  we  find  the 
tears  tit  to  be  wept  at  such  a  spectacle  I  or,  could  we  realise  the  calamity  in 
all  its  extent,  what  tokens  of  commiseration  and  concern  would  be  deemed 
equal  to  the  occasion  I  Would  it  suffice  for  the  sun  to  veil  his  light,  and 
the  moon  her  brightness ;  to  cover  the  ocean  with  mourning,  and  the  heavens 
with  sackloth  ?  or  were  the  whole  fabric  of  nature  to  become  animated  and 
vocal,  would  it  be  possible  for  her  to  utter  a  groan  too  deep,  or  a  cry  too 
piercing,  to  express  the  magnitude  and  extent  of  such  a  catastrophe  ? " 

Another  of  his  most  celebrated  flights  occurs  in  the  magnificent 
sermon  on  '  The  Glory  of  God  in  Concealing.' 

Pathos. — We  remarked  that  Jeremy  Taylor  describes  the  miser- 
ies of  human  life  more  as  a  poet  than  as  a  preacher  of  morality. 
Hall  was  opposed  to  this  on  principle.  He  thought  that  the 
preacher  should  endeavour  not  so  much  to  be  tender  and  touch- 
ing, as  to  stir  his  hearers  to  virtuous  action.  He  distinguishes 
clearly  the  pathetic  and  the  practical  treatment  of  distress: — 

"  There  are  kinds  of  distress  founded  on  the  passions,  which,  if  not 
applauded,  are  at  least  admired  in  their  excess,  as  implying  a  peculiar 
refinement  of  sensibility  in  the  mind  of  the  sufferer.  Embellished  by 
taste,  and  wrought  by  the  magic  of  genius  into  innumerable  forms,  they 
turn  grief  into  a  luxury,  and  draw  from  the  eyes  of  millions  delicious  tears. 
.  .  .  Nor  can  I  reckon  it  among  the  improvements  of  the  present  age, 
that,  by  the  multiplication  of  works  of  fiction,  the  attention  is  diverted 
from  scenes  of  real  to  those  of  imaginary  distress  ;  from  the  distress  which 
demands  relief,  to  that  which  admits  of  embellishment :  in  consequence  of 
which  the  understanding  is  enervated,  the  heart  is  corrupted,  and  those  feel- 
ings which  were  designed  to  stimulate  to  active  benevolence  are  employed  in 
nourishing  a  sickly  sensibility.  .  .  .  Though  it  cannot  be  denied  that 
by  diffusing  a  warmer  colouring  over  the  visions  of  fancy,  sensibility  is  often 
a  source  of  exquisite  pleasures  to  others  if  not  to  the  possessor,  yet  it  should 
never  be  confounded  with  benevolence.  ...  A  good  man  may  have 
nothing  of  it ;  a  bad  man  may  have  it  in  abundance. " 

Wherever,  therefore,  Hall  describes  scenes  of  misery,  he  does  so 
in  such  away  as  to  "stimulate  to  active  benevolence,"  and  makes 
no  attempt  to  diffuse  over  them  the  warmer  colouring  that  "  draws 
from  the  eyes  of  millions  delicious  tears."  His  well- known  picture 
of  the  horrors  of  war  is  an  example. 

Besides,  his  genius  inclined  much  more  to  sublimity  than  to 


512  FKOM   1790  TO   1820. 

pathos.  In  the  Funeral  Sermon  for  the  Princess  Charlotte,  from 
which  we  have  already  given  a  quotation,  he  passes  lightly  over 
the  affecting  aspects  of  death,  dilates  in  magnificent  strains  on 
such  collateral  themes  as  the  grandeurs  of  eternity,  and  exhibits 
"the  uncertainty  of  human  prospects,  and  the  instability  of 
earthly  distinctions,"  as  considerations  to  "  check  our  presump- 
tion, and  appal  our  hearts." 

And  again,  for  purposes  of  pathos,  his  diction  is  too  Latinised : 
language  can  hardly  be  touching  unless  it  is  simple.  His  frequent 
use  of  controversial  forms  is  peculiarly  jarring,  when  the  theme  is 
of  a  tender  nature.  Take  for  example  his  '  Reflections  on  the  In- 
evitable Lot  of  Human  Lifa'  He  begins  in  a  determined  tone, 
as  if  he  meant  to  overbear  a  very  obstinate  opponent — "  TJiere  is 
nothing  better  established  by  universal  observation,  than  that  the 
condition  of  man  upon  earth  is  less  or  more  an  afflicted  condition : 
'  Man  is  born  unto  trouble  as  the  sparks  fly  upward.'  "  Through- 
out the  sermon  the  melancholy  train  of  reflection  is  harshly  broken 
by  these  disputatious  turns  of  expression.  Thus — "  If  we  are 
tempted  to  repine  at  seeing  others  in  peace  and  prosperity,  while 
we  are  harassed  and  distressed,  we  form  a  most  inadequate  and 
premature  judgment.  Their  period  of  trial  will  arrive,"  <kc.  In 
expressing  the  pathos  of  pious  confidence  he  introduces  the  same 
fatal  intellectual  hardness.  The  effect  of  the  following  passage  is 
destroyed  by  the  two  clauses  marked  in  italics — a  chilling  limita- 
tion, and  a  no  less  lowering  comparison : — 

"  That  the  Lord  reigns,  is  one  of  those  truths  which  lie  at  the  very  basis 
of  piety;  nor  is  there  any  more  consoling.  Jt  fills  the  heart,  under  a  right 
impression  of  it,  with  a  cheerful  hope  and  unruffled  tranquillity,  amidst  the 
changes  and  trials  of  life,  wlvich  we  shall  look  for  in  vain  from  any  other 
quarter. " 

The  last  sentence  should  have  been  expressed  in  some  such  way 
as  follows : — 

"Amidst  the  changes  and  trials  of  life,  it  fills  the  heart  with  cheerful 
hope  and  unruffled  tranquillity." 

KINDS   OF   COMPOSITION. 

Persuasion. — Hall's  Latinised  diction  and  argumentatative  forms 
were  against  his  popularity  as  a  preacher.  How  it  came  about 
that  he  was  popular  in  spite  of  these  drawbacks  is  explained  by 
John  Foster : — 

"  There  was  a  remission  of  strict  connection  of  thought  towards  the  con- 
clusion, where  he  threw  himself  loose  into  a  strain  of  declamation,  always 
earnest,  and  often  fervid.  This  was  of  great  effect  in  securing  a  degree  of 
favour  with  many,  to  whom  so  intellectual  a  preacher  would  not  otherwise 


THEOLOGY.  613 

have  been  acceptable ;  it  was  this  that  reconciled  persons  of  simple  ptetv 
•nd  little  cultivated  understanding.  Many  who  might  follow  him  with 
very  imperfect  apprehension  and  satisfaction  through  the  preceding  parts, 
could  reckon  on  being  warmly  interested  at  the  end.  ' 

On  the  whole,  however,  his  was  not  a  style  of  preaching  that 
was  likely  to  have  much  practical  effect  on  the  conduct  of  his 
hearers.  He  was  much  too  general  both  in  his  exaltation  of 
virtue  and  in  his  denunciation  of  vice.  John  Foster  relates  that 
after  a  sermon  on  the  sin  and  absurdity  of  covetousness,  one  of 
the  hearers  observed  to  another — "An  admirable  sermon — yet 
why  was  such  a  sermon  preached  ?  For  probably  not  one  person 
in  the  congregation,  though  it  is  not  wanting  in  examples  of 
the  vice  in  question,  would  take  the  discourse  as  at  all  applicable 
to  himself."  "  Too  many  of  the  attendants,"  says  Foster,  "  wit- 
nessed some  of  the  brightest  displays  rather  with  the  feeling  of 
looking  at  a  fine  picture  than  of  being  confronted  by  a  faithful 
mirror ;  and  went  away  equally  pleased  with  a  preacher  that  was 
so  admirable,  and  with  themselves  for  having  the  intelligence  and 
taste  to  admire  him." 

"  It  appeared  a  serious  defect  in  Mr  Hall's  preaching,  that  he  practically 
took  on  him  too  little  of  this  responsibility  of  distinguishing  degrees  of 
Christian  virtue.  In  temporary  oblivion  of  the  rule  that  theoretic  descrip- 
tion should  keep  existing  fact  so  much  in  view  that  a  right  adjustment  may 
be  made  between  them,  he  would  expatiate  in  eloquent  latitude  on  the 
Christian  character,  bright  and  '  full-orbed '  in  all  its  perfections,  of  con- 
tempt of  the  world,  victory  over  temptation,  elevated  devotion,  assimilation 
to  the  divine  image,  zeal  for  the  divine  glory,  triumphant  faith,  expansive 
charity,  sanctity  of  life ;  without  an  intimation,  at  the  time  or  afterward, 
that  all  this,  so  sublime  if  it  were  realised,  so  obligatory  as  the  attainment 
toward  which  a  Christian  should  be,  at  whatever  distance,  aspiring,  is  yet 
unhappily  to  be  subjected,  on  behalf  of  our  pool  nature,  to  a  cautious  dis- 
cussion of  modifications  and  degrees  ;  especially  when  the  anxious  question 
comes  to  be,  What  deficiencies  prove  a  man  to  be  no  Christian  t " 


OTHER    WRITERS. 
THEOLOGY. 

About  the  beginning  of  this  period  the  Evangelical  movement 
inaugurated  by  Wesley  and  Whitefield  among  the  lower  classes, 
began  to  make  itself  powerfully  felt  in  higher  circles.  One  of  ita 
chief  leaders  was  Charles  Simeon  (1759-1836),  appointed  vicar  of 
Trinity  Church  in  Cambridge  in  1782.  Simeon  was,  in  the  face 
of  very  bitter  opposition,  an  energetic  preacher  of  evangelical 
doctrine,  and  a  generous  patron  of  pious  young  men,  such  as 
Henry  Martin  and  Henry  Kirke  White.  He  bore  the  chief  part 
in  originating  the  missionary  schemes  of  the  English  Church. 
His  'Horae  Homileticae'  (complete  in  21  vols.,  1832)  is  a 

2  K 


514  FROM  1790  TO   1820. 

sentative  exposition  of  evangelical  views. — Another  repiesenta- 
tive  work  of  this  school  of  religious  thought,  of  a  more  popular 
character,  is  Wilberforce's  '  Practical  Christianity,'  published  by 
the  great  agitator  for  the  abolition  of  the  Slave  Trade  in  1797. 
This  work  has  gone  through  fifty  editions  in  England  and  America, 
and  has  been  translated  into  several  European  languages. 

To  the  same  school  belonged  the  brothers  Milner, — Joseph 
Milner  (1744-1797),  vicar  of  Hull,  and  Isaac  Milner  (1751-1820), 
Senior  Wrangler,  Master  of  Queen's  College,  and  Dean  of  Car- 
lisle,— two  sturdy-minded  natives  of  Yorkshire,  who  raised  them- 
selves from  humble  lifa  The  '  History  of  the  Church '  was  begun 
by  the  elder  brother  in  1794,  and  finished  by  the  younger  in  1812. 
Isaac  Milner  is  said  to  have  been  the  means  of  converting  Wilber- 
force  to  evangelical  piety,  and  he  was  an  honoured  member  of  the 
society  that  we  have  already  mentioned  as  influencing  the  youth 
of  Macaulay. 

With  these  may  be  linked,  as  an  Evangelical  of  a  different  type, 
John  Foster  (1770-1843),  a  Baptist  clergyman,  a  friend  of  Robert 
Hall's,  known  in  general  literature  as  a  writer  of  essays.  Foster 
was  far  from  having  Hall's  reputation  as  a  preacher :  he  was  a 
reserved  kind  of  man,  and  his  power  lay  more  exclusively  with 
the  pen.  The  best  known  of  his  essays,  which  have  passed  through 
many  editions,  is  one  "  On  Decision  of  Character."  He  cultivated 
originality  both  in  thought  and  in  expression.  His  command  of 
language  and  illustration  is  copious,  but  his  style  has  a  want  of 
flow,  an  air  of  labour.  He  repeats  an  idea  again  and  again,  but 
the  successive  repetitions  do  not,  like  the  varied  expression  of 
Chalmers,  make  the  meaning  more  and  more  luminous;  they 
often  burden  rather  than  illuminate  the  general  reader,  and  they 
strike  the  critic  as  a  laboured  exercise  in  the  accumulation  of 
synonyms  and  similitudes. 

We  may  place  in  another  group  the  divines  that  engaged  deeply 
in  politics.  Chief  among  these  (excluding  Bishop  Horsley,  who 
remained  during  the  first  half  of  this  period  the  Jupiter  of  Con- 
servative Churchmen)  stands  Dr  Samuel  Parr  (1747-1825),  known 
in  his  day  as  the  Whig  Samuel  Johnson,  but  by  the  present  gen- 
eration hardly  distinguished  from  the  founder  of  "Parr's  Life 
Pills."  Parr  was  a  man  of  unquestionable  ability,  and  the  oblivion 
that  has  overtaken  his  name  is  due  to  his  having  left  no  great 
work  on  any  great  subject  His  fame  rested  upon  two  accom- 
plishments, both  perishable  foundations, — Latin  scholarship  and 
powers  of  conversation.  His  pre-eminence  in  Latin  composition 
was  universally  acknowledged  :  although  a  Whig,  he  was  selected 
tc  write  the  epitaphs  of  Johnson  and  of  Burke.  His  powers  of 
conversation  are  attested  by  evidence  equally  unequivocal :  al- 
though he  held  no  higher  station  than  the  curacy  of  Ilatton,  he 


THEOLOGY.  615 

was  received  at  the  tables  of  the  Whig  nobility,  and  corresponded 
with  "  nearly  one-half  of  our  British  peerage,  and  select  members 
of  the  royal  family."  His  talents  secured  this  admission  to  high 
life  in  spite  of  a  rude  dogmatic  manner,  a  homely  person,  and 
eccentricity  in  the  matter  of  dress.  Besides  this  indirect  evidence 
of  his  social  acceptability,  we  have  the  direct  evidence  of  Johnson, 
whom  the  lesser  Samuel  imitated  in  the  rudeness  of  his  manner — 
"  Sir,"  he  said  to  Langton,  "  I  am  obliged  to  you  for  having  asked 
me  this  evening.  Parr  is  a  fair  man.  I  do  not  know  when  I  have 
had  an  occasion  of  such  free  controversy."  With  all  this  it  is 
strange  that  Parr  never  received  the  coveted  distinction  of  a 
bishopric  :  the  explanation  probably  is  that  his  chief  patron,  Fox, 
died  just  as  the  Whigs  came  into  power,  and  that  his  other  friends 
in  high  circles  were  not  so  indulgent  to  his  arrogantf  eccentricities 
and  classical  licence  of  personal  invective.  His  style  was  grandilo- 
quent to  an  extravagant  extreme.  De  Quiucey  speaks  of  "  his 
periodic  sentences,  with  their  ample  volume  of  sound  and  self- 
revolving  rhythmus ; "  and  of  "  his  artful  antithesis,  and  solemn 
anti-libration  of  cadences."  And  Sydney  Smith,  who  reviewed  his 
'  Spital  Sermon '  in  the  first  number  of  the  '  Edinburgh  Review,' 
characterises  the  style  as  follows:  "The  Doctor  is  never  simple 
and  natural  for  a  single  instant  Everything  smells  of  the  rheto- 
rician. He  never  appears  to  forget  himself,  or  to  be  hurried  by  his 
subject  into  obvious  language.  Every  expression  seems  to  be  the 
result  of  artifice  and  intention ;  and  as  to  the  worthy  dedicatees, 
the  Lord  Mayor  and  Aldermen,  unless  the  sermon  be  done  into 
English  by  a  person  of  honour,  they  may  perhaps  be  flattered  by 
the  Doctor's  politeness,  but  they  can  never  be  much  edified  by  his 
meaning.  Dr  Parr  seems  to  think  that  eloquence  consists  not  in 
an  exuberance  of  beautiful  images — not  in  simple  and  sublime 
conceptions — not  in  the  language  of  the  passions  ;  but  in  a  studi- 
ous arrangement  of  sonorous,  exotic,  and  sesquipedal  words." 

Another  clergyman  and  politician,  more  successful  in  the  world 
than  Parr,  was  Richard  Watson  (1737-1816),  successively  Second 
Wrangler  at  Cambridge,  Professor  of  Chemistry,  Professor  of 
Divinity,  and  Bishop  of  Llandaff.  In  politics  he  was  a  moderate 
Whig ;  he  vindicated  the  principles  of  the  French  Revolution  at 
the  outset,  but  in  1798  he  issued  'An  Address  to  the  People  of 
Great  Britain,  warning  them  of  the  danger  which  the  French 
Revolution  taught  them.'  He  also  wrote  'An  Apology  for  Chris- 
tianity,' in  reply  to  Gibbon ;  and  '  An  Apology  for  the  Bible,'  in 
reply  to  Paine.  His  own  orthodoxy  was  suspected.  He  was  an 
exceedingly  ambitious  man,  and  although  more  than  once  in  his 
life  he  received  undeserved  promotion,  yet  in  his  autobiography  he 
is  indignant  that  the  Whigs  did  not  prefer  him  to  a  more  lucrative 
see. — Watson's  anti-revolutionary  address  was  fiercely  commented 


516  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

on  by  Gilbert  Wakefleld  (1756-1801\  the  son  of  an  English  rector, 
who  took  orders  in  the  Church,  but  left  it  from  conscientious 
scruples.  He  was  a  very  scholarly  man,  and  published  a  trans- 
lation of  the  New  Testament,  and  '  An  Inquiry  concerning  the 
Person  of  Christ.'  An  earnest  creature,  of  sensitive  excitable 
temperament,  he  felt  warmly,  and  gave  fearless  expression  to  his 
convictions.  He  was  prosecuted  for  his  reply  to  the  Bishop  of 
Llandaff,  and  imprisoned  for  two  years.  He  survived  his  imprison- 
ment only  a  few  months. 

PHILOSOPHY. 

In  this  generation  the  philosophy  of  Reid  was  upheld  by  Dugald 
Stewart  (1753-1828),  Professor  of  Mathematics,  and  subsequently, 
from  1785  to  1810,  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy,  in  Edinburgh. 
He  propounded  little  that  was  original  in  philosophy ;  his  opinions 
were  for  the  most  part  modifications  of  Reid ;  but  as  an  expositor 
of  philosophical  doctrines,  his  reputation  stands  deservedly  high. 
Most  of  his  works  were  composed  after  his  retirement  from  the 
Chair  of  Philosophy  in  1810.  A  remark  is  sometimes  made  that 
his  best  works  were  his  pupils ;  the  plain  paraphrase  of  which  is 
that  he  was  a  person  of  stately  manners  and  polished  oratory,  and 
— a  rare  thing  then  for  a  man  in  his  position — a  Whig  in  politics, 
and  that  several  scions  of  the  Whig  nobility  were  placed  in  Edin- 
burgh under  his  care.  Along  with  a  fine  presence,  Stewart  pos- 
sessed great  natural  eloquence.  James  Mill  used  to  declare  that 
though  he  had  heard  Pitt  and  Fox  deliver  some  of  their  most  ad- 
mired speeches,  he  never  heard  anything  nearly  so  eloquent  as 
some  of  the  lectures  of  Professor  Stewart  While  his  account  of 
Mind  coincides  in  the  main  with  Reid's,  the  statement  and  illus- 
tration of  the  doctrines,  and  the  arguments  on  points  of  dispute, 
are  his  own.  He  is  the  most  ornate  and  elegant  of  our  philosophi- 
cal writers.  His  summaries  of  philosophical  systems  are  some- 
times praised  as  being  especially  perspicuous  and  interesting.  His 
manner  as  a  controversialist  is  peculiarly  agreeable  when  taken 
in  contrast  to  the  hard-hitting  and  open  ridicule  of  such  contro- 
versialists as  Priestley :  Stewart's  copious  lubricated  eloquence  is 
much  better  fitted  to  conciliate  opponents  than  win  assent. 

Thomas  Brown  (1778-1820)  was  appointed  colleague  to  Stewart 
in  the  Moral  Philosophy  Chair  in  1810,  and  discharged  the  duties 
of  the  office  till  his  death  in  1820.  Brown  is  an  often-quoted  case 
of  precocious  genius :  he  composed  and  published  '  Observations 
on  Darwin's  Zoonomia '  before  he  had  completed  his  twentieth 
year.  He  was  one  of  the  band  of  young  men  that  originated  the 
1  Edinburgh  Review,'  and  he  wrote  a  paper  on  Kant  in  the  second 
number;  but  he  took  offence  and  seceded  before  the  Review  was 


PHILOSOPHY.  5 1 7 

many  months  old.  In  1805  he  published  an  'Inquiry  into  the 
Relation  of  Cause  and  Effect'  During  the  ten  years  of  his  pro- 
fessoriate, he  published  several  poems,  which  possessed  little  origi- 
nal merit,  and  soon  relapsed  into  the  province  of  the  antiquarian. 
In  his  philosophy,  Brown  agreed  with  Reid  and  Stewart  in  ascrib- 
ing an  intuitive  origin  to  certain  beliefs,  and  differed  from  them  in 
some  minor  points  of  nice  distinction  relating  to  external  percep- 
tion. He  was  a  very  popular  lecturer :  he  was  more  sentimental 
than  Stewart,  his  style  was  more  florid,  and  his  criticism  of  his 
predecessors  was  acrimonious  and  racy,  not  to  say  flippant. 

The  most  influential  and  original  philosopher  of  this  generation 
was  Jeremy  Bentham  (1748-1832),  the  founder  of  the  science  of 
Jurisprudence,  and  the  first  to  make  a  thorough  application  of  the 
principle  of  Utility  to  practical  affairs.  The  sou  of  a  London 
solicitor,  he  was  sent  to  Westminster  School,  and  to  Oxford,  and 
bred  to  the  law  ;  but,  cherishing  a  strong  repugnance  to  legal 
abuses,  he  refrained  from  the  practice  of  his  profession,  and  lived 
the  life  of  a  studious  recluse. 

His  character  and  writings  are  very  impartially  discussed  in  a 
well-known  essay  by  Mr  John  Stuart  Mill  ('  Dissertations,'  vol.  i.) 
"  Bentham  has  been  in  this  age  and  country  the  great  questioner 
of  things  established.  It  is  by  the  influence  of  the  modes  of 
thought  with  which  his  writings  inoculated  a  considerable  number 
of  thinking  men,  that  the  yoke  of  authority  has  been  broken,  and 
innumerable  opinions,  formerly  received  on  tradition  as  incontest- 
able, are  put  upon  their  defence,  and  required  to  give  an  account 
of  themselves."  He  "  carried  the  war  of  criticism  and  of  refuta- 
tion, the  conflict  with  falsehood  and  absurdity,  into  the  field  of 
practical  abuses."  Nor  was  he  merely  a  negative,  destructive,  or 
subversive  philosopher.  His  mind  was  eminently  positive,  con- 
structive, synthetic.  He  never  pulled  down  without  building  up. 
After  showing  that  an  institution  was  inconsistent  with  his  funda- 
mental principles,  he  always  suggested  a  substitute  that  was  con- 
sistent therewith.  His  method  of  procedure  was  more  important 
than  his  results.  His  method  "  may  be  shortly  described  as  the 
method  of  detail ;  "of  treating  wholes  by  separating  them  into  their 
parts,  abstractions  by  resolving  them  into  things, — classes  and 
generalities  by  distinguishing  them  into  the  individuals  of  which 
they  are  made  up ;  and  breaking  every  question  into  pieces  before 
attempting  to  solve  it"  The  method  was  not  by  any  means 
absolutely  original;  but  "whatever  originality  there  was  in  the 
method,  in  the  subjects  he  applied  it  to,  and  in  the  rigidity  with 
which  he  adhered  to  it,  there  was  the  greatest."  Again,  "the 
generalities  of  his  philosophy  itself  have  little  or  no  novelty.  To 
ascribe  any  to  the  doctrine  that  general  utility  is  the  foundation 
of  morality,  would  imply  great  ignorance  of  the  history  of  philo- 


518  FROM  1790  TO   1820. 

Sophy,  of  general  literature,  and  of  Bentham's  own  writings.  He 
derived  the  idea,  as  he  says  himself,  from  Helvetius;  and  it  was 
the  doctrine,  no  less,  of  the  religious  philosophers  of  that  age, 
prior  to  Reid  and  Beattie."  As  regards  the  results,  those  achieved 
in  the  field  of  Ethics  are  not  nearly  so  valuable  as  those  achieved 
in  the  field  of  Jurisprudence.  [The  value  of  Bentham's  labours  in 
Jurisprudence  is  universally  admitted.  Even  his  somewhat  un- 
^riendly  critic  Macaulay  says,  with  characteristic  sweep,  that  he 
"  found  jurisprudence  a  gibberish  and  left  it  a  science."]  Tn 
Ethics  his  conclusions  are  marred  by  the  peculiarities  of  his  own 
character.  "  Bentham's  contempt,  then,  of  all  other  schools  of 
thinkers,  his  determination  to  create  a  philosophy  wholly  out  of 
the  materials  furnished  by  his  own  mind,  and  by  minds  like  his 
own,  was  his  first  disqualification  as  a  philosopher.  His  second 
was  the  incompleteness  of  his  own  mind  as  a  representative  of 
universal  human  natura  In  many  of  the  most  natural  and  strong- 
est feelings  of  human  nature  he  had  no  sympathy ;  from  many  of 
its  graver  experiences  he  was  altogether  cut  off;"  and  he  was 
deficient  in  the  power  by  which  one  human  being  enters  into  the 
mind  and  circumstances  of  another.  "  His  knowledge  of  human 
nature  is  wholly  empirical ;  and  the  empiricism  of  one  who  has 
had  little  experience.  He  had  neither  internal  experience  nor 
external ;  the  quiet,  even  tenor  of  his  life,  and  his  healthiness  of 
mind,  conspired  to  exclude  him  from  both.  He  never  knew  pros- 
perity and  adversity,  passion  nor  satiety.  He  never  had  even 
cue  experiences  which  sickness  gives ;  he  lived  from  childhood  to 
the  age  of  eighty-five  in  boyish  health.  He  knew  no  dejection,  no 
heaviness  of  heart.  He  was  a  boy  to  the  last.  .  .  .  Other 
ages  and  other  nations  were  a  blank  to  him  for  purposes  of  in- 
struction. He  measured  them  but  by  one  standard ;  their  know- ' 
ledge  of  facts,  and  their  capability  to  take  correct  views  of  utility, 
and  merge  all  other  objects  in  it" — His  style  is  much  better  in 
his  early  writings  than  in  his  later.  His  '  Fragment  on  Govern- 
ment,' published  anonymously,  was  so  well  written  that  it  waa 
attributed  to  some  of  the  greatest  masters  of  style  at  the  time. 
Even  in  the  most  involved  of  his  later  writings  we  meet  with  many 
happy  turns  of  expression,  and  with  imagery  "  quaint  and  humor- 
ous, or  bold,  forcible,  and  intense."  His  great  fault  is  intricacy. 
The  origin  of  this  is  well  explained  by  Mr  Mill :  "  From  the  same 
principle  in  Bentham  came  the  intricate  and  involved  style,  which 
makes  his  later  writings  books  for  the  student  only,  not  the  gen- 
eral reader.  It  was  from  his  perpetually  aiming  at  impracticable 
precision.  Nearly  all  his  earlier,  and  many  parts  of  his  later 
writings,  are  models,  as  we  have  already  observed,  of  light,  play- 
ful, and  popular  style :  a  Benthamiana  might  be  made  of  passages 
worthy  of  Addison  or  Goldsmith.  But  in  his  later  years  and  more 


PHILOSOPHY.  519 

advanced  studies,  he  fell  into  a  Latin  or  German  structure  of  sen- 
tence, foreign  to  the  genius  of  the  English  language.  He  could 
not  bear,  for  the  sake  of  clearness  and  the  reader's  ease,  to  say,  as 
ordinary  men  are  content  to  do,  a  little  more  than  the  truth  in  one 
sentence,  and  correct  it  in  the  next  The  whole  of  the  qualifying 
remarks  which  he  intended  to  make,  he  insisted  upon  embedding 
as  parentheses  in  the  very  middle  of  the  sentence  itself.  And 
thus,  the  sense  being  so  long  suspended,  and  attention  being  re- 
quired to  the  accessory  ideas  before  the  principal  idea  had  been 
properly  seized,  it  became  difficult,  without  some  practice,  to  make 
out  the  train  of  thought." 

With  Bentham,  Mr  Mill  ranks  as  the  other  great "  seminal  mind  " 
of  England  in  that  generation  the  poet  Samual  Taylor  Coleridge 
(1772-1834).  Bentham's  leading  purpose  was  to  provide  good  sub- 
stitutes for  the  bad  side  in  existing  institutions.  Coleridge  in- 
sisted rather  upon  the  good  side,  and  the  propriety  of  making  the 
most  of  that.  Coleridge  was  also  the  first  great  English  champion 
of  German  transcendental  philosophy.  It  was  principally  through 
conversation  that  he  exercised  his  influenca  To  some  extent, 
also,  he  disseminated  his  opinions  in  print,  although  he  was  too 
confirmed  an  opium-eater  to  be  a  persistent  worker.  In  1 796  he 
issued  nine  numbers  of  a  Radical  weekly  paper,  called  '  The 
Watchman';  in  1809-10  twenty-seven  numbers  of  the  'Friend,' — 
an  unfinished  project  designed  to  convey  a  consistent  body  of 
opinions  in  Theology,  Philosophy,  and  Politics;  in  1816  'The 
Statesman's  Manual,  or  the  Bible  the  best  Guide  to  Political  Skill 
and  Foresight,  a  Lay  Sermon';  in  1817  'A  Second  Lay  Sermon,' 
"on  the  existing  distresses  and  discontents  ";  in  1817  'Biographia 
Literaria,'  a  history  of  the  development  of  his  own  opinions ;  in 
1825  'Aids  to  Reflection.'  His  prose  style  is  copious,  and  has 
something  of  the  soft  melody  of  his  verse. 

To  this  period  belong  also  two  well-known  names  in  Political 
Economy,  the  Rev.  T.  E.  Malthus  (1766-1836)  and  David  Ricardo 
(1772-1823).  Malthus's  celebrated  work  on  '  Population '  appeared 
in  1798.  Ricardo's  'Political  Economy'  was  published  in  1817. 
Both  are  moderately  perspicuous  writers,  but  neither  of  them  pos- 
sessed any  special  gift  of  style. 

Archibald  Alison  (1757-1839),  son  of  an  Edinburgh  magis- 
trate, educated  at  Glasgow  and  at  Oxford,  latterly  an  Episcopal 
clergyman  in  Edinburgh,  is  known  in  letters  as  the  father  of 
the  historian,  Sir  Archibald,  and  as  the  author  of  an  '  Essay  on 
Taste,'  published  in  1790,  and  in  1811  commended  and  adopted 
in  its  leading  positions  by  the  critical  potentate,  Francis  Jeffrey. 
Alison  denied  that  there  is  any  intrinsic  pleasure  either  in 
sound,  in  colour,  or  in  form.  He  resolved  the  emotions  of  sub- 
limity and  beauty  into  associations  with  primitive  sensibilities. 


520  FROM   1790  TO   1820. 

The  'Essay'  is  written  in  a  very  readable  style  for  a  work  of 
abstruse  analysis. 

Another  literary  man  of  this  generation,  best  known  through 
his  son,  is  Isaac  Disraeli  (1766-1848),  author  of  'Curiosities 
of  Literature,'  '  Literary  Miscellanies,'  '  Quarrels  of  Authors,' 
'Calamities  of  Authors,'  &c.  His  'Literary  Character,'  an  at- 
tempt to  analyse  the  constituents  of  literary  genius,  was  a 
favourite  with  Byron.  In  the  writings  of  the  elder  Disraeli  we 
meet  with  occasional  touches  of  the  felicity  of  expression  so 
conspicuous  in  his  more  distinguished  son. 

HISTORY. 

The  most  considerable  history  published  in  the  early  part  of 
this  period  was  Mitford's  '  History  of  Greece."  William  Mitford 
(1744-1827)  was  the  son  of  an  English  proprietor  near  Southamp- 
ton, served  with  Gibbon  as  an  officer  in  the  Hampshire  militia, 
and  sat  for  many  years  in  Parliament  His  History  appeared  in 
successive  volumes  at  long  intervals  between  1784  and  1818.  The 
writer  was  a  stanch  Conservative,  and  part  of  the  success  of  the 
work,  in  those  days  of  political  apprehension,  was  due  to  the  use 
he  made  of  the  proceedings  and  the  disasters  of  the  Grecian  re- 
publics to  point  a  moral  against  democracy.  The  work  was  very 
derisively  reviewed  by  the  young  Whig  Macaulay  in  one  of  his 
first  efforts,  and  it  was  humorously  pronounced  by  the  Conserva- 
tive De  Quincey  to  be  "  choleric  in  excess,  and  as  entirely  partial, 
as  nearly  perfect  in  its  injustice,  as  human  infirmity  would  allow." 
Mitford's  style  is  in  general  verbose,  periodic,  and  heavy.  There 
is,  however,  a  certain  animation  in  his  narratives  of  striking  events; 
and  his  expression  sometimes  receives  a  warm  colour  from  the 
strength  of  his  feelings  as  a  political  partisan.  He  is  included  by 
De  Quincey  among  "orthographic  mutineers,"  eccentrics  in  the 
matter  of  spelling. 

The  history  of  Greece  was  written  also  by  John  Gillies  (1747- 
1836),  an  alumnus  of  Glasgow,  and  travelling  tutor  to  a  son  of  the 
Earl  of  Hopetoun,  who  in  1793  succeeded  Robertson  as  historio- 
grapher-royal for  Scotland,  and  figured  in  the  literary  society  of 
"  Modern  Athens  "  during  the  first  quarter  of  this  century.  H  is 
'History  of  Greece 'was  published  in  1786.  He  published  also 
translations  from  Aristotle,  wrote  upon  Frederick  the  Great,  and 
continued  his  history  down  to  the  reign  of  Augustus.  All  hia 
works  have  been  eclipsed,  as  regards  both  matter  and  manner. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

William  Cobbett  (1762-1835)  raised  himself,  by  the  force  of  his 
self-educated  literary  powers,  from  the  station  of  a  private  soldier 


MISCELLANEOUS    WRITERS.  521 

to  a  seat  in  Parliament  He  could  not  remember  a  time  when  he 
did  not  earn  his  own  living.  An  impulsive,  self-willed  lad,  work- 
ing with  his  father,  a  small  farmer  in  Surrey,  he  first  made  an 
abortive  attempt  to  go  to  sea ;  then  ran  away  to  London  and 
obtained  employment  as  an  attorney's  clerk ;  from  that  enlisted 
as  a  private  soldier,  and  went  abroad  with  his  regiment  Obtain- 
ing his  discharge  after  eight  years'  service,  he  emigrated  to  America 
in  1792,  and  soon  distinguished  himself  as  a  violent  political  writer, 
standing  up  with  a  characteristic  love  of  contradiction  against  the 
ruling  democratic  faction.  The  extreme  virulence  of  his  abuse 
soon  made  the  States  too  hot  for  him :  after  two  trials  for  libel 
and  one  conviction,  with  sweeping  damages,  he  returned  to  Eng- 
land in  1800,  and  commenced  political  writer  in  London  under  his 
American  nickname  "Peter  Porcupine."  For  a  short  time  he 
wrote  on  the  side  of  the  Conservatives;  but  he  soon  quarrelled 
with  them,  and  became,  what  he  ever  afterwards  continued,  an 
ultra-Radical  His  famous  paper,  '  The  Weekly  Political  Regis- 
ter,' was  begun  in  1802,  and  continued  till  his  death.  He  exer- 
cised great  influence  upon  the  working  classes,  and  raised  intense 
hostility  among  those  opposed  to  his  opinions :  he  was  several 
times  prosecuted  for  libel,  and  in  1817  he  had  to  recross  the 
Atlantic  to  evade  the  pressure  of  a  short-lived  Act  of  Parliament, 
which  he  asserted  to  have  been  passed  for  his  special  annoyance. 
After  several  unsuccessful  attempts  to  gain  a  seat  in  Parliament, 
he  was  returned  for  the  borough  of  Oldham  in  1832,  but  he  lived 
only  three  years  to  enjoy  his  honours,  and  made  no  figure  in  the 
House.  Besides  his  political  writings,  he  composed  a  French 
Grammar  and  an  English  Grammar,  and  towards  the  close  of  his 
life  wrote  'Rural  Rides'  and  'Advice  to  Young  Men.' — Cobbett 
has  been  called  "The  Last  of  the  Saxons,"  and  the  designation 
may  be  allowed  if  the  essence  of  the  Saxon  character  is  taken  to 
be  dogged,  impracticable,  unaccommodating  energy,  and  indomi- 
table courage.  Exceedingly  impetuous,  he  needed  only  opposition 
to  make  his  most  random  impulses  persistent.  He  was  a  man 
destined  to  excite  strong  feelings  wherever  he  went,  troubling  the 
political  world  as  a  strongly-charged  electrical  cloud  troubles  the 
atmosphera  He  was  a  great  master  of  clear  and  forcible  idio- 
matic English.  His  '  Rural  Rides '  expounds  the  homely  aspects 
of  English  scenery  with  much  picturesqueness  and  graphic  neat- 
ness of  touch.  In  his  political  diatribes  he  indulged  in  a  licence 
of  invective  and  abuse  almost  incredible  to  newspaper  readers  of 
this  generation,  although  it  was  not  so  much  above  the  ordinary 
heat  of  his  time. 

A  strong  contrast  to  the  pragmatic  Cobbett  was  the  amiable, 
indolent,  speculative  Sir  James  Mackintosh  (1765  - 1832).  A 
native  of  Inverness-shire,  he  \\as  a  student,  along  with  Robert 


522  FROM    1790  TO   1820. 

Hall,  at  King's  College,  Aberdeen;  went  to  Edinburgh  in  1784 
to  qualify  for  the  practice  of  Physic;  and  in  1788  set  out  for 
London  with  a  doctor's  degree,  to  push  his  fortunes.  He  failed 
to  establish  himself  in  medical  practice,  and  was  obliged  to  depend 
for  a  livelihood  mainly  on  his  literary  abilities.  He  was  first 
brought  into  notice  by  his  '  Vindiciae  Gallic*,'  a  glowing  defence 
of  the  French  Revolution  against  the  denunciations  of  Burke. 
Soon  after,  he  abandoned  medicine  for  law,  and  was  called  to  the 
bar  in  1795.  In  1803  he  distinguished  himself  by  his  defence  of 
Peltier  against  a  prosecution  for  a  libel  on  Bonaparte.  In  1804 
he  was  appointed  Recorder  of  Bombay.  After  seven  years  of 
"sickly  vegetation"  in  India,  he  returned  with  an  impaired  con- 
stitution ;  entered  Parliament ;  was  appointed  Professor  of  Law  in 
the  East  India  College  at  Haileybury;  wrote  philosophical  dis- 
sertations for  the  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  and  miscellaneous 
articles  for  the  '  Edinburgh  Review ' ;  and  remained  for  twenty 
years  a  very  acceptable  member  of  general  society.  The  great 
literary  ambition  of  his  life  was  to  write  the  History  of  England : 
for  this  he  had  accumulated  many  materials,  but  he  left  only  a 
fragment  on  the  Causes  of  the  Revolution  of  1688.  He  wrote 
also  for  '  Lardner's  Cyclopaedia '  a  Life  of  Sir  Thomas  More,  and 
an  abridgment  of  English  History,  carried  down  as  far  as  the 
Reformation.  Mackintosh  was  an  amiable  and  able  man,  humor- 
ously introspective  and  tolerant,  fond  of  reading  and  of  society, 
and  an  observant  critic  both  of  books  and  of  men.  Easy,  good- 
humoured  indolence,  aggravated  by  his  residence  in  India,  stood 
between  him  and  durable  reputation.  His  fame,  like  Dr  Parr's, 
rests  chiefly  on  perishable  traditions  of  his  conversational  power : 
he  had  no  Boswell  to  preserve  specimens  for  us,  and  we  have  only 
such  reports  as  the  testimony  of  Sydney  Smith — "  His  conversa- 
tion was  more  brilliant  and  instructive  than  that  of  any  human 
being  I  ever  had  the  good  fortune  to  be  acquainted  with."  His 
rank  is  not  high  either  as  a  philosopher  or  as  a  historian  :  he  was 
naturally  averse  to  vigorous  exertion,  whether  in  reasoning  or  in 
research;  his  authority  was  weakened,  as  he  himself  knew  and 
admitted,  by  an  amiable  propensity  to  eulogistic  declamation. 

Miscellaneous  writing  received  a  new  impulse  in  the  early  part 
of  the  nineteenth  century  by  the  establishment  of  the  Reviews  and 
the  Magazines — namely, '  Edinburgh  Review '  in  1802  ;  '  Quarterly 
Review'  in  1808;  'Blackwood's  Magazine'  in  1817;  'London 
Magazine'  in  1820;  and  'Westminster  Review'  in  1823.  We 
give  some  account  of  a  few  of  the  principal  writers  in  our  con- 
cluding chapter. 


CHAPTER    X. 


SELECT  WRITERS  OF  THE  EARLY  PART  OF  THIS 
CENTURY. 


THEOLOGY. 

Thomas  Chalmers,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  (1780-1847),  is  the  most  celebrated 
name  among  the  preachers  of  the  Church  of  Scotland.  A  native 
of  Anstruther,  in  the  county  of  Fife,  he  was  sent  at  the  age  of 
twelve  to  the  University  of  St  Andrews,  and  was  licensed  to 
preach  in  1799.  In  1802  he  was  presented  to  the  charge  of  Kil- 
many  in  Fife.  During  his  college  course,  and  the  first  six  years 
of  his  ministry,  he  seems  to  have  held  no  serious  views  in  religion ; 
in  fact,  he  seems  to  have  entered  the  Church  in  heartless  scepti- 
cism, simply  as  a  means  of  securing  a  livelihood.  His  favourite 
studies  were  scientific.  In  the  interval  between  his  obtaining 
licence  and  his  coming  of  age,  he  studied  chemistry,  natural 
philosophy,  and  moral  philosophy  under  the  Edinburgh  pro- 
fessors of  the  time.  During  the  winter  after  his  presentation  to 
Kilmany,  he  taught  the  mathematical  class  in  the  University  as 
assistant  to  a  superannuated  professor :  during  the  following 
winter,  having  quarrelled  with  the  University  authorities,  he 
set  up  opposition  lectures  in  the  town;  and  not  satisfied  with 
lecturing  in  the  winter  at  St  Andrews,  he  also  lectured  on 
chemistry  to  his  parishioners  at  Kilmany  during  the  summer. 
He  was  an  unsuccessful  candidate  for  the  Professorship  of  Mathe- 
matics at  St  Andrews,  and  subsequently  for  a  similar  post  in 
the  University  of  Edinburgh.  He  was  lieutenant  and  chaplain 
to  a  regiment  of  Volunteers.  He  published  a  book  on  '  The 
Extent  and  Stability  of  the  National  Resources.'  Altogether 
his  life  was  at  this  time  most  laborious  and  eccentric.  His 
composition  of  the  article  "Christianity"  for  the  'Edinburgh 


524  FROM    1820. 

Encyclopaedia'  seems  to  have  been  a  turning-point  in  his  career. 
The  death  of  a  sister  in  1808,  and  a  lingering  illness  in  the  follow- 
ing year,  are  also  mentioned  as  circumstances  that  helped  to  fix 
his  thoughts  more  upon  the  peculiar  work  of  the  ministry.  From 
about  that  time  dates  the  beginning  of  his  fame  as  a  preacher. 
In  1815  he  accepted  a  call  to  the  Tron  Church  in  Glasgow.  Dur- 
ing the  eight  years  of  his  ministry  there,  he  acquired  as  a  preacher 
and  a  social  reformer  a  wider  reputation  than  had  ever  before 
attended  the  labours  of  a  minister  of  the  Church  of  Scotland. 
His  '  Astronomical  Discourses '  raised  universal  admiration ;  and 
when  he  visited  London,  the  leading  wits  of  the  day,  and  notably 
Canning  and  Wilberforce,  "  formed  part  of  his  congregation  wher- 
ever he  preached,  and  vied  with  one  another  in  their  anxiety  to  do 
him  honour  in  society."  His  *  Commercial  Discourses'  also  had 
an  enormous  circulation.  As  a  social  reformer  he  was  known  by 
his  advocacy  of  Malthusianism,  his  extraordinary  energy  In  organ- 
ising the  voluntary  contributions  for  the  relief  of  the  poor,  and  his 
personal  efforts  to  "  excavate  the  practical  heathenism  of  our  large 
cities."  In  1823  he  was  appointed  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy 
in  St  Andrews;  in  1827  declined  an  offer  of  a  chair  of  Moral 
Philosophy  in  University  College,  London;  and  in  1828  accepted 
a  Divinity  Professorship  in  Edinburgh.  The  first  extra-official 
work  of  his  professorial  life  was  a  continuation  of  papers  on  the 
1  Christian  and  Civic  Economy  of  Large  Towns,'  begun  before  he 
left  Glasgow :  this  was  soon  followed  in  the  same  direction  by  a 
course  of  lectures  on  Political  Economy,  which,  when  published  in 
1832,  were  highly  praised  by  the  authorities  in  that  subject.  He 
also  published  his  lectures  on  Natural  Theology  and  on  Christian 
Evidences,  and  wrote  the  Bridgewater  Treatise  on  "the  adapta- 
tion of  the  world  to  the  mental  constitution  of  man."  In  addition 
to  his  professorial  and  literary  labours,  he  played  a  prominent  part 
in  the  Courts  of  the  Church  :  he  was  particularly  distinguished  by 
his  schemes  for  Church  extension,  and  by  the  lead  that  he  took  in 
the  controversies  terminating  in  the  Disruption.  He  was  chosen 
by  acclamation  Moderator  of  the  first  Free  Church  Assembly,  and 
spent  his  latter  years  as  Principal  of  the  Free  Church  College 
in  Edinburgh.  He  had  no  small  influence  in  raising  and  establish- 
ing what  is  known  as  the  Sustentation  Fund.  His  collected  works 
fill  thirty-four  duodecimo  volumes. 

We  have  mentioned  his  extraordinary  fame  as  a  preacher.  His 
appearance  is  described  as  being  by  no  means  prepossessing ;  he 
had  a  hard  voice  and  a  broad  pronunciation ;  his  gestures  were 
uncouth  ;  and,  unlike  Robert  Hall,  he  brought  a  written  sermon 
to  the  pulpit,  and  confined  his  eyes  to  the  manuscript.  The 
charm  seems  to  have  lain  in  his  fervid  nervous  energy.  The 
hearers  were  laid  hold  of  by  his  extraordinary  concentrated  em- 


JAMES  MILL.  525 

phasis  and  graphic  expression,  and  brought  almost  mesmerically 
under  his  influence.  As  an  author,  he  is  distinguished  more  for 
his  statement  of  the  views  of  others  than  for  the  excogitation  of 
anything  profoundly  original.  It  may  with  confidence  be  pro- 
nounced that  he  had  a  greater  genius  for  exposition  than  any 
other  Scotchman  of  this  century  except  Carlyle.1  We  cannot  read 
a  page  of  Chalmers  without  feeling  ourselves  in  the  hand  of  a 
master  of  luminous  and  varied  exposition.  Himself  possessing 
the  clearest  grasp  of  his  subject,  he  fully  comprehended  and 
kept  steadily  in  view  the  difficulties  of  the  reader :  he  sought  to 
unfold  his  matter  in  the  most  luminous  sequence,  and  to  make 
sure  that  one  point  was  thoroughly  expounded  before  he  pro- 
ceeded to  the  next.  He  insisted  upon  being  vividly  understood. 
His  habit  of  persistent  repetition,  of  turning  over  each  proposition 
and  presenting  it  in  many  different  shapes,  is  the  most  remarkable 
feature  in  his  style.  Robert  Hall  is  reported  to  have  dwelt  upon 
this  in  conversation :  "  He  often  reiterates  the  same  thing  ten  or 
twelve  times  in  the  course  of  a  few  pages.  Even  Burke  himself 
had  not  so  much  of  that  peculiarity.  His  mind  resembles  .  .  . 
a  kaleidoscope.  Every  turn  presents  the  object  in  a  new  and 
beautiful  form ;  but  the  object  presented  is  still  the  same.  .  .  . 
He  may  be  said  to  indulge  in  this  repetition  to  a  faulty  excess. 
His  mind  seems  to  move  on  hinges,  not  on  wheels.  There  is 
incessant  motion,  but  no  progress.  When  he  was  at  Leicester, 
he  preached  a  most  admirable  sermon,  on  the  necessity  of  immedi- 
ate repentance ;  but  there  were  only  two  ideas  in  it,  and  on  these 
his  mind  revolved  as  on  a  pivot"  Whether  Chalmers  carries 
repetition  to  excess  is  matter  of  opinion  :  in  a  popular  expositor 
excessive  repetition  is  an  error  upon  the  right  side.  It  is  incorrect 
to  say  that  there  is  no  progress  in  his  expositions ;  there  is  pro- 
gress, but  it  is  slow  and  thorough. 

HISTORY. 

In  1817-18  was  published  the  'History  of  British  India,'  by 
James  Mill  (1773-1836),  celebrated  afterwards  as  a  writer  on 
psychology,  ethics,  and  sociology.  "An  ampler  title  to  distinction 
in  history  and  philosophy,"  writes  the  late  Mr  Grote,  ''can  seldom 
be  produced  than  that  which  Mr  James  Mill  left  behind  him.  We 
know  no  work  which  surpasses  his  'History  of  British  India' 
in  the  main  excellences  attainable  by  historical  writers:  indus- 
trious accumulation,  continued  for  many  years,  of  original  author- 
ities— careful  and  conscientious  criticism  of  their  statements,  and 

1  It  is  rather  a  remarkable  fact  that  both  these  men  in  their  younger  dayi 
were  distinguished  as  mathematicians.  Such  combinations  of  high  scientific 
with  the  highest  literary  aptitude  are  rare. 


526  FROM   1820. 

a  large  command  of  psychological  analysis,  enabling  the  author  to 
interpret  phenomena  of  society,  both  extremely  complicated  and 
far  removed  from  his  own  personal  experience."  Born  in  Kin- 
cardineshire,  not  far  from  the  birthplace  of  Thomas  Reid,  Mill 
was  educated  after  a  fashion  and  with  a  purpose  very  common 
in  Scotland  :  he  was  sent  to  the  school  of  his  native  parish,  Logic- 
Pert  ;  to  the  grammar-school  of  the  nearest  town,  Montrose ;  and 
to  the  University  of  Edinburgh;  and  he  was  destined  to  the 
ministry  of  the  Kirk.  But  after  receiving  licence  as  a  preacher, 
he  relinquished  his  intended  profession,  and  took,  about  the 
beginning  of  this  century,  a  step  that  Jeffrey  about  the  same 
time  had  thoughts  of  taking — went  to  London,  and  settled  there 
as,  to  use  Jeffrey's  expression,  a  literary  "grub."  He  became 
editor  of  the  'Literary  Journal,'  a  short-lived  adventure,  and 
wrote  for  the  'Eclectic  Review,'  the  'Edinburgh  Review,'  and 
other  periodicals.  He  made  the  acquaintance  of  Jeremy  Ben- 
tham,  and  for  a  number  of  years  he  and  his  family  lived  during 
the  summer  in  Bentham's  country-housa  His  '  History  of  British 
India'  was  commenced  in  1806.  In  1819,  the  year  after  the  pub- 
lication of  this  work,  he  was  offered  the  high  post  of  Assistant- 
Examiner  of  Correspondence  in  the  India  House,  in  which  he  was 
ultimately  chief  Examiner,  an  office  nearly  equivalent  to  the 
Under-Secretaryship  of  State  for  Indian  Affairs.  Shortly  after  his 
appointment  to  the  India  House  he  contributed  to  the  '  Encyclo- 
paedia Britannica'  the  articles  on  Government,  Jurisprudence, 
Liberty  of  the  Press,  Prison  Discipline,  Colonies,  Law  of  Nations, 
and  Education.  He  was  one  of  the  principal  contributors  to  the 
'Westminster  Review,'  which  was  founded  in  1823.  His  chief 
works  on  more  abstruse  subjects  are — '  Elements  of  Political 
Economy,'  1821-22;  'Analysis  of  the  Human  Mind,'  1829;  and 
'Fragments  on  Mackintosh,'  1835. — Mill  was  endowed  with 
eminent  powers  of  expression  and  illustration.  Bentham  judged 
rightly  in  helping  him  on  as  a  promising  expositor  of  utilitarian 
principles.  His  strength,  however,  lay  more  in  the  logical,  scientific 
faculty :  men  were  drawn  to  his  books  more  by  the  severe  and 
penetrating  rationality  of  the  matter  than  by  the  attractions 
of  the  style.  The  severity  of  his  style  was  probably  deepened 
by  a  lurking  cynicism  that  on  several  occasions  made  itself 
disagreeably  conspicuous :  a  man  of  clear  insight  and  intense 
reserved  disposition,  he  had  something  like  a  passionate  hatred 
of  superficial  knowledge  and  gushing  sentimentality,  and  he 
opposed  the  philosophy  of  Sir  James  Mackintosh  and  the  ami- 
able Hindu  extravagance  of  Sir  William  Jones  with  too  much 
asperity,  and  in  the  case  of  Jones  with  some  disadvantage 
to  the  truth.  His  style  possesses  very  little  figurative  orna- 
ment ;  it  aims  at  brief  and  clear  expression  as  the  main  chance ; 


HENRlt    MALLAM.  627 

and  its  principal  charms  are  the  severe  charms  of  sententious 
iucisiveness  and  occasional  strokes  of  epigrammatic  point.  His 
'Encyclopaedia'  essays  have  always  been  exceedingly  popular 
among  hard-headed  people :  they  have  none  of  the  softer  graces 
of  style,  but  they  are  almost  unrivalled  as  efforts  at  the  concise 
application  of  general  principles  to  practical  life ;  and,  in  addition 
to  their  "  pithy "  character,  their  constant  endeavour  to  give  the 
pith  of  the  matter  in  the  briefest  possible  statement,  they  contain 
sharp  stimulating  touches  of  epigram  and  of  cynical  paradox. 
Macaulay's  criticism  that  "his  arguments  are  stated  with  the 
utmost  affectation  of  precision,  his  divisions  are  awfully  formal, 
and  his  style  is  generally  as  dry  as  that  of  Euclid's  elements,"  is, 
like  too  many  of  Macaulay's  criticisms,  an  extreme  caricature. 
The  main  defect  in  these  essays  is  pointed  out  by  the  author's 
son,  Mr  John  Stuart  Mill,  in  the  chapter  on  the  "  Geometrical 
method  of  reasoning  in  Politics"  (Logic,  ii.  471).  The  'History 
of  British  India '  is  a  perspicuous,  well-arranged  narrative,  written 
without  much  pretence  to  fine  composition.  As  in  his  essays,  the 
style  is  enlivened  chiefly  by  epigrammatic  turns,  succinct  maxims, 
and  sharp  cynical  criticisms.  The  value  of  the  work  consists 
mainly  in  its  clear  analysis  of  institutions,  and  its  reviews  of  legal 
and  political  transactions  by  the  light  of  general  principles.1  Con- 
cerning Mill's  other  principal  works  we  quote  the  opinion  of  Mr 
Grote :  "  Mr  James  Mill's  '  Elements  of  Political  Economy'  were, 
at  the  time  when  they  appeared,  the  most  logical  and  condensed 
exposition  of  the  entire  science  then  existing.  Lastly,  his  latest 
avowed  production,  the  '  Analysis  of  the  Phenomena  of  the  Human 
Mind,'  is  a  model  of  perspicuous  exposition  of  complex  states  of 
consciousness,  carried  farther  than  by  any  other  author  before  him." 
Henry  Hallam  (1777-1859)  is  the  author  of  three  celebrated 
historical  works.  The  son  of  a  dignitary  of  the  English  Church, 
he  received  his  education  at  Eton  and  Oxford,  and  afterwards 
studied  law  in  the  Inner  Temple;  but  possessing  some  private 
fortune,  and  holding  besides  a  Goverment  sinecure,  he  was  inde- 
pendent of  professional  emolument,  and  devoted  himself  to  litera- 
ture. He  attached  himself  to  the  Whig  party,  wrote  for  the 
'Edinburgh  Review,'  took  an  active  part  in  the  Anti-slavery 

1  Its  value  was  much  increased  gome  twenty  years  ago  by  the  annotations  of 
Mr  Wilson,  Boden  Professor  of  Sanscrit  in  Oxford,  who  followed  Mill  step  by 
step  over  the  field  with  a  superior  knowledge  of  Hindu  literature.  It  appears 
that  Mill,  while  his  work  is  fully  entitled  to  the  praise  of  extensive  research,  was 
somewhat  prejudiced  against  the  Hindus  by  his  antipathy  to  what  he  considered 
the  overestimate  of  them  formed  by  Sir  William  Jones.  Mr  Wilson  not  only 
corrects  Mill's  errors  in  matters  of  fact,  but  pursues  him  throughout  with  a  sharp 
criticism  of  his  conclusions  regarding  men  and  measures  ;  and  while  he  cannot 
be  said  to  show  the  same  superiority  in  judgment  that  he  shows  in  scholarship, 
the  caustic  criticising  of  the  critic  forms  an  interesting  by-play  in  the  perusal  of 
the  book.  Mr  Wilson  also  continues  the  history  up  to  his  own  time. 


528  FROM  1820. 

agitation,  and  was  united  with  Brougham,  Mackintosh,  Russell, 
Al thorp,  and  other  notabilities  of  his  party,  in  the  establishment 
of  the  Society  for  the  Diffusion  of  Useful  Knowledge.  His  '  View 
of  the  State  of  Europe  during  the  Middle  Ages,'  pronounced  by 
foreign  critics  to  be  "beyond  contradiction"  the  best  of  his  works, 
was  published  in  1818;  his  '  Constitutional  History  of  England' 
in  1827  ;  his  'Introduction  to  the  Literature  of  Europe  during  the 
1 5th,  1 6th,  and  ijth  Centuries,'  in  1838-39.  In  1830  George  IV. 
instituted  two  gold  medals  for  the  best  historical  works  of  hia 
reign  :  and  Hallam  and  Washington  Irving  were  the  historians 
that  his  Majesty  delighted  to  honour.  Hallam's  works  are  praised 
for  industrious  research  and  dignified  impartiality ;  his  Constitu- 
tional History  is  accepted  as  the  standard  work  on  that  subject. 
He  had  great  reputation  as  a  scholar ;  Byron  calls  him  "  classic 
Hallam  much  renowned  for  Greek:"  but  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  his  Introduction  to  the  Literature  of  Europe  was  not  too 
ambitious  a  work  for  any  one  man  not  possessed  of  the  resources  of 
Faust.  Certainly  his  criticisms  of  English  writers,  though  always 
expressed  with  elegance,  will  not  always  bear  close  examination, 
and  too  often  give  evidence  of  very  superficial  and  second-hand 
knowledge.1  Ornate,  dignified  elegance  is  the  characteristic  of 
his  style :  for  popular  purposes  it  is  perhaps  too  Latinised. 

Sir  Archibald  Alison,  Bart.,  the  historian  of  Modern  Europe, 
born  December  29,  1792,  was  the  son  of  the  Rev.  Archibald 
Alison,  author  of  the  '  Essay  on  Taste,'  who,  at  the  time  of  his 
birth,  was  vicar  of  Kenley  in  Shropshire.  His  father  removing  to 
Edinburgh  when  he  was  five  years  old,  he  received  his  school  and 
university  education  there,  and  became,  in  1814,  an  advocate  at 
the  Scotch  bar.  He  was  at  Paris  in  1814,  "when  Talma  played 
before  a  pitful  of  kings ; "  and  there  conceived  the  idea  of  record- 
ing from  its  first  beginnings  the  stirring  series  of  events  that 
was  supposed  to  have  terminated  in  the  meeting  of  the  Allied 
sovereigns.  The  prosecution  of  this  idea  cost  him  "fifteen  sub- 
sequent years  of  travel  and  study,  and  fifteen  more  of  composi- 
tion ;"  the  first  instalment  of  his  '  History  of  Europe  from  1789  to 
the  Restoration  of  the  Bourbons  in  1815'  making  its  appearance 
in  1833,  and  the  concluding  volumes  in  1844.  Meantime  this  was 
far  from  being  his  sole  occupation  :  he  published  '  Principles  of  the 
Criminal  Law  of  Scotland'  in  1832,  and  'Practice  of  the  Criminal 
Law'  in  1833;  and  from  1834  he  discharged  the  duties  of  the 
sheriffdom  of  Lanarkshire.  He  was  a  frequent  contributor  to 
'  Blackwood's  Magazine ' ;  a  selection  of  his  contributions  in  three 
volumes  was  published  in  1850.  He  wrote  also  'Principles  of 
Population,'  1840;  '  Free  Trade  and  Protection,'  1844;  'England 
in  1815  and  in  1845  '  >  'Life  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough,'  1847. 
1  For  example  see  p.  213  of  this  work. 


SIR  ARCHIBALD   ALISON.  529 

In  the  latter  years  of  his  busy  life  he  continued  his  History  to  the 
accession  of  Louis  Napoleon  in  1852 ;  the  successive  volumes 
appearing  between  1852  and  1859.  He  was  created  a  baronet  by 
Lord  Derby's  Ministry  in  1852.  His  death  took  place  on  the  23d 
of  May  1867. — Sir  Archibald  was  in  politics  an  extreme  Conserva- 
tive :  he  remained  an  uncompromising  opponent  to  the  principles 
of  Free  Trade,  and  he  never  ceased  to  represent  the  Reform  Bill  of 
1832  as  inaugurating  an  era  of  disorganisation  and  decay.  Two 
of  his  opinions  in  particular  have  been  subjected  to  much  criticism: 
one  that  crime  is  increased  rather  than  diminished  by  merely 
intellectual  education  —  a  doctrine  inculcated  also  by  Auguste 
Comte,  and  which  presents  a  considerable  field  for  casuistry ;  and 
the  other  relating  to  the  amount  of  harm  done  to  British  com- 
mercial interests  by  the  return  to  a  metallic  currency  after  the 
conclusion  of  the  Napoleonic  wars.  His  peculiar  views  are  strongly 
enounced  in  the  later  continuation  of  his  History.  But,  as  is 
admitted  by  the  sharpest  critics  of  this  work,  his  Toryism  and  his 
crotchets  are  not  allowed  to  interfere  with  the  fairness  and  candour 
of  his  narrative,  or  with  his  estimates  of  political  opponents.  The 
'  Edinburgh  Review '  credits  him  with  "  an  entire  freedom  from  all 
mean  and  petty  jealousies  or  rancorous  sentiments  towards  his 
antagonists;"  and  affirms  that  "he  has  a  generous  and  hearty 
appreciation  of  all  merit  which  he  perceives,  and  can  bestow 
praise  in  no  stinted  measure  even  on  those  most  opposed  to  him." 
In  addition  to  this,  one  of  the  first  requisites  for  the  supremely 
difficult  task  of  writing  contemporary  history,  Sir  Archibald  dis- 
played the  greatest  industry  in  collecting  materials  for  his  work ; 
all  agree  in  bearing  testimony  to  the  thoroughness  of  his  researches. 
Very  little  exception  has  been  taken  to  the  accuracy  of  his  facts, 
as  regards  either  omission  or  positive  error — less  than  has  been 
taken  in  the  case  of  Macaulay's  '  History  of  England ' ;  adverse 
critics  have  confined  themselves  principally  to  his  opinions.  His 
style  has  been  exposed  to  considerable  animadversions  :  gram- 
marians have  cited  from  his  pages  numerous  violations  of  grammar, 
and  the  '  Edinburgh  Review '  charges  him  with  verbosity,  and  with 
excessive  pomp  in  the  enunciation  of  his  general  reflections.  These, 
however,  are  faults  that  occur  chiefly  to  the  critic  and  the  cynic ; 
and  the  critics  of  Sir  Archibald's  style  do  not  appear  to  have 
sufficiently  accounted  for  the  extraordinary  world-wide  popularity 
of  the  work.  The  '  History  of  Europe,'  widely  circulated  at  home, 
has  been  translated  into  all  European  languages,  and  also  into 
Arabic  and  Hindustani :  in  a  work  designed  for  general  reading, 
such  popularity  may  be  taken  as  a  proof  of  excellence,  unless  good 
reasons  can  be  assigned  to  the  contrary.  The  intrinsic  interest  of 
the  events  narrated,  absorbing  as  that  undoubtedly  was,  and  the 
author's  industrious  accuracy,  great  as  that  was,  do  not  constitute 

2L 


530  FROM   1820. 

a  sufficient  explanation ;  the  interesting  story  is  undeniably  told 
with  high  narrative  skill.  When  we  disregard  minute  errors  of 
structure,  and  look  to  general  effects,  we  find  many  excellences  of 
style  that  help  to  explain  his  popularity.  The  historian  possesses 
a  flowing  command  of  simple  and  striking  language,  always  equal 
to  the  dignity  and  spirit  of  the  events  related,  and  enlivened  by 
happy  turns  of  antithesis  and  epigram.  He  had  a  feeling  for 
dramatic  contrasts,  and  introduces  them  with  striking  effect.  He 
visited  the  scenes  of  all  the  important  engagements,  and  his  de- 
scriptions have  the  freshness  and  animation  of  pictures  drawn  from 
nature.  Finally,  what  is  of  prime  importance  in  such  a  work, 
though  he  deals  with  highly  complicated  affairs  involving  the 
interaction  of  several  different  powers,  he  keeps  the  concurring 
streams  of  events  lucidly  distinct,  and  brings  the  reader  withput 
perplexity  to  their  joint  conclusion.  His  explanatory  episodes  are 
peculiarly  elaborate  and  luminous.  In  short,  it  has  been  well  said 
that  "  if  the  art  of  engaging  the  reader's  attention,  and  sustaining 
it  by  the  vigour,  spirit,  and  vivacity  of  the  narrative  be  a  high 
merit,  many  popular  and  many  great  historians  must  cede  superi- 
ority of  this  kind  to  Sir  Archibald  Alison." 

PHILOSOPHY. 

Sir  William  Hamilton,  Bart.  (1788-1856),  the  greatest  British 
supporter  of  a  priori  philosophy  in  this  century,  was  the  son  of  Dr 
W.  Hamilton,  Professor  of  Anatomy  in  the  University  of  Glasgow. 
He  was  the  lineal  representative  and  was  adjudged  heir  to  the  title 
of  Sir  Robert  Hamilton,  the  leader  of  the  Covenanting  forces  at 
Drumclog.  His  father  died  when  he  was  two  years  old.  He  re- 
ceived his  schooling  partly  at  home,  partly  at  the  public  schools  of 
Glasgow,  and  partly  at  private  schools  in  England.  He  passed 
through  the  curriculum  of  Arts  in  Glasgow,  and  spent  a  winter  at 
Edinburgh  in  the  study  of  medicine,  which  he  was  inclined  to 
make  his  profession.  In  1807  he  went  to  Oxford  as  an  exhibitioner 
on  the  Snell  Foundation.  There  he  became  engrossed  in  the  study 
of  mental  philosophy,  and  in  the  final  examination  professed  a 
knowledge  of  an  unusual  (though  currently  very  much  exaggerated) 
list  of  books,  and  was  passed  with  the  highest  distinction.  About 
this  time  he  abandoned  his  design  of  entering  the  profession  of 
medicine,  and  ultimately  settled  at  Edinburgh  as  a  lawyer,  being 
called  to  the  bar  in  1814,  three  years  after  his  graduation  as  B.A. 
at  Oxford.  In  1820  he  was  an  unsuccessful  candidate  for  the 
Chair  of  Moral  Philosophy,  vacated  by  the  death  of  Brown,  the 
appointment  being  given  to  John  Wilson.  In  the  following  year 
he  was  appointed  to  the  poorly-salaried  Chair  of  Civil  History. 
His  appointment  to  the  Chair  of  Logic  did  not  take  place  till  1836. 


SIR  WILLIAM   HAMILTON.  531 

By  this  time,  through  articles  contributed  to  the  '  Edinburgh  Re- 
view,' and  subsequently  reprinted  under  the  title  of  '  Dissertations 
and  Discussions  in  Philosophy,'  he  had  obtained  European  reputar 
tion  as  a  philosopher.  In  1844  his  health  was  much  shattered  by 
an  attack  of  paralysis  of  the  right  side,  which,  while  it  left  his  mind 
uninjured,  permanently  disabled  the  side  affected,  impairing  his 
eyesight  and  his  speech,  and  leaving  him  with  an  imperfect  use  of 
his  right  arm  and  right  leg.  "  He  had  so  far  recovered  from  his 
illness  in  the  winter  of  1844-45  as  to  be  able  to  resume  his  studies, 
and  he  continued  the  work  of  reading  and  thinking  with  but  slight 
interruptions  till  a  few  days  before  his  death  in  May  1856.  The 
editing  of  Reid,  which  had  suffered  so  much  from  interruptions, 
was  resumed.  The  work  was  finally  published — though  without 
being  completed — in  November  1846.  The  supplementary  disser- 
tations D*  *  and  D*  *  *  had  been  written  before  his  illness."  His 
class  lectures  on  Logic  and  Metaphysics  were  published  after  his 
death,  under  the  editorial  charge  of  the  late  Dean  Mansel  and  Pro- 
fessor Veitch,  his  pupils. — In  his  youth  Hamilton  was  a  very 
handsome,  athletic  man.  He  is  described  by  Carlyle  as  having 
"a  fine  firm  figure  of  middle  height;  one  of  the  finest  cheerfully- 
serious  human  faces,  of  square,  solid,  and  yet  rather  aquiline  type ; 
and  a  pair  of  the  beautifullest  kindly-beaming  hazel  eyes,  well 
open,  and  every  now  and  then  with  a  lambency  of  smiling  fire  in 
them,  which  I  always  remember  as  if  with  trust  and  gratitude." 
"  He  was  finely  social  and  human  in  these  walks  or  interviews. 
His  talk  was  forcible,  copious,  discursive,  careless  rather  than 
otherwise ;  and  on  abstruse  topics,  I  observed,  was  apt  to  become 
embroiled  and  revelly,  much  less  perspicuous  and  elucidative  than 
with  a  little  deliberation  he  could  have  made  it.  ...  By 
lucid  questioning  you  could  get  lucidity  from  him  on  any  topic." 
In  company  he  had  no  pretensions  to  shine  as  a  talker,  and  list- 
ened quietly  without  showing  any  disposition  to  strike  in,  unless 
he  had  a  special  interest  in  the  subject,  when  he  became  animated 
and  fluent.  "  He  did  not  accommodate  himself  to  the  prevailing 
opinions  of  the  company ;  but  rather  took  delight  in  running  atilt 
against  them  in  a  good-humoured  way.  He  had  great  pleasure  in 
stating  and  defending  some  paradox  or  startling  opinion  (of  which 
he  would  perhaps  afterwards  make  a  joke),  not  because  it  exactly 
represented  his  own  opinion,  but  sometimes  merely  for  the  sake  of 
argument,  and  more  frequently  with  the  wish  to  uphold  the  un- 
popular side  of  a  question  under  discussion."1  "The  prevailing 
opinion  on  a  subject,  when  strongly  put,  had  a  tendency  to  arouse 
in  him  a  feeling  of  opposition."  "As  in  intellect  he  was  critical, 
so  in  temperament  he  was  strongly  polemical,  even  finding  a  cer- 
tain enjoyment  in  conflict  for  its  own  sake."  "  His  views  on 
1  Professor  Veitch's  Memoir  of  Sir  William  Hamilton,  p.  142. 


532  FROM   1820. 

University  matters  brought  him  pretty  frequently  into  sharp  colli- 
sion with  some  of  his  colleagues.  For  with  all  his  lovableness, 
even  tenderness  of  nature,  Hamilton  was  yet  a  man  of  resolute 
will,  and  high  and  somewhat  uncompromising  temper."  From  the 
time  of  his  extraordinary  examination  at  Oxford,  his  erudition 
and  encyclopedic  reading  became  a  subject  of  wonder  and  exagger- 
ated rumour.  He  seems  to  have  had  something  of  the  same  book- 
devouring  turn  as  Johnson.  Johnson  is  described  as  "  tearing  out 
the  heart "  of  a  book,  and  Sir  William,  in  a  coarser  modification 
of  the  phrase,  as  "  tearing  out  the  entrails  " — expressions  that 
point  to  the  same  habit  of  glancing  at  the  table  of  contents,  the 
index,  or  the  marginal  annotations,  and  reading  only  what  one 
happens  to  be  interested  in.  The  two  men  agreed  further  in 
combining  with  this  literary  epicureanism  (or  rather  gluttony)  a 
reluctance  to  compose  ;  but  Hamilton,  who  had  a  decided  mechani- 
cal turn,  preserved  the  results  of  his  reading  in  an  elaborately 
ingenious  commonplace-book,1  whereas  Johnson  left  what  he  read 
to  the  chances  of  resuscitation  by  his  powerful  memory.  Of  late 
years  both  the  extent  and  the  accuracy  of  Hamilton's  scholarship 
have  been  questioned,  but  with  all  deductions  he  still  remains 
what  he  was  represented  to  De  Quincey  as  being — "  a  monster  of 
erudition." — We  do  not  here  attempt  any  outline  of  his  philoso- 
phy ;  and  his  philosophical  abilities  are  still  matter  of  dispute. — 
As  regards  style,  he  had,  with  his  prodigious  memory,  a  fine  com- 
mand of  language ;  his  command  of  the  language  of  controversy, 
especially  for  the  purpose  of  summarily  "  putting  down  "  an  an- 
tagonist, is  at  least  as  good  as  his  command  of  the  language  of 
philosophical  exposition.  In  both  operations  he  is  masterly.  He 
had  a  taste  for  antithesis  and  pithy  compression.  He  was  also 
notably  studious  of  method,  of  good  arrangement ;  more,  appar- 
ently, from  a  love  of  mechanical  symmetry,  than  from  any  lively 
sympathy  with  the  difficulties  of  the  reader. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

Francis  Jeffrey  (1773-1850),  the  chief  of  the  originators  of  the 
'Edinburgh  Review,'  was  the  son  of  a  depute-clerk  of  the  Court 
of  Session,  and  received  his  early  education  at  the  Edinburgh 
High  School.  He  pursued  university  studies  partly  at  Glasgow, 
partly  at  Oxford,  and  partly  at  Edinburgh,  exercising  himself  all 
the  while  voluminously  in  English  composition.  At  Oxford  he 
remained  only  nine  months,  and  left  with  a  sense  of  relief,  finding 
the  routine  subjects  of  study  very  uncongenial.  He  was  called  to 
the  Edinburgh  bar  in  1794.  Entertaining  the  then  unpopular  prin- 
ciples of  the  Whig  party,  his  career  was  for  several  years  the  re- 
1  Professor  Veitch's  Memoir  of  Sir  William  Hamilton,  p.  386. 


FRANCIS   JEFFREY.  533 

rerse  of  pro&perous,  and  more  than  once  he  had  serious  thoughts 
of  abandoning  the  profession.  The  establishment  of  the  '  Edin- 
burgh Review'  in  1802  was  the  making  of  his  fame  and  fortune. 
"  Without  patronage,  without  name,  under  the  tutelage  of  no 
great  man ;  propounding  heresies  of  all  sorts  against  the  ruling 
fancies  of  the  day,  whether  political,  poetical,  or  social ;  by  sheer 
vigour  of  mind,  resolution  of  purpose,  and  an  unexampled  com- 
bination of  mental  qualities — five  or  six  young  men  in  our  some- 
what provincial  metropolis  laid  the  foundation  of  an  empire  to 
which,  in  the  course  of  a  few  years,  the  intellect  of  Europe  did 
homage."  The  sociable  and  clear-sighted  Jeffrey  was  admirably 
fitted  to  keep  together  and  direct  the  energies  of  this  fortuitous 
concourse  of  unemployed  talent.  His  fame  grew  with  the  fame 
of  the  work.  He  rose  rapidly  to  a  first-rate  position  at  the  bar. 
His  election  to  the  Rectorship  of  Glasgow  University  in  1820  was 
a  proof  of  the  general  admiration  of  his  powers.  His  election  as 
Dean  of  the  Faculty  of  Advocates  in  1829  was  a  proof  that  he 
enjoyed  the  highest  popularity  among  his  brother  lawyers.  From 
1830,  for  about  three  years  and  a  half,  he  held  office  in  the  "Whig 
Ministry  as  Lord  Advocate.  In  1833  he  was  appointed  one  of  the 
Judges  of  the  Court  of  Session,  and  lived  in  the  quiet  discharge 
of  his  judicial  duties  and  the  pleasant  society  of  "  Modern  Athens  " 
until  his  seventy-seventh  year,  when  he  died,  after  a  brief  illness, 
on  the  z6th  of  January  1850.* — Jeffrey  was  a  dark,  wiry,  little 
creature,  with  small  mobile  features,  black  sparkling  eyes,  and  a 
remarkably  long,  narrow  head.  His  voice  was  high-pitched,  his 
speech  somewhat  mincing,  and  his  movements  exceedingly  ani- 
mated. "Jeffrey's  manner,"  wrote  his  friend  Horner,  "almost 
irresistibly  impresses  upon  strangers  the  idea  of  levity  and  super- 
ficial talents."  His  appearance,  however,  did  not  do  him  justice. 
"  He  has  indeed  a  very  sportive  and  playful  fancy,  but  it  is  accom- 
panied with  an  extensive  and  varied  information,  with  a  readiness 

1  The  following  is  his  own  account  of  his  connection  with  the  'Edinburgh 
Jleview ':  "  I  wrote  the  first  article  in  the  first  number  of  the  Review  in  Oc- 
tober 1802,  and  sent  my  last  contribution  to  it  in  October  1840 !  It  is  a  long 
period  to  have  persevered  in  well — or  in  ill  doing !  But  I  was  by  no  means 
equally  alert  in  the  service  during  all  the  intermediate  time.  I  was  sole  editor 
from  1803  till  late  in  1829 ;  and  during  that  period  was  no  doubt  a  large  and 
regular  contributor.  In  that  last  year,  however,  I  received  the  great  honour  of 
being  elected,  by  my  brethren  of  the  bar,  to  the  office  of  Dean  of  the  Faculty  of 
Advocates  ;  when  it  immediately  occurred  to  me  that  it  was  not  quite  fitting 
that  the  official  head  of  a  great  Law  Corporation  should  continue  to  be  the  con- 
ductor of  what  might  be  fairly  enough  represented  as,  in  many  respects,  a  party 
journal ;  and  I  consequently  withdrew  at  once  and  altogether  from  the  manage- 
ment. ...  I  wrote  nothing  for  it  for  a  considerable  time  subsequent  to 
1829  ;  and  during  the  whole  fourteen  years  that  have  since  elapsed,  have  sent  in 
all  but  four  papers  to  that  work,  none  of  them  on  political  subjects.  1  ceased 
in  reality  to  be  a  contributor  in  1829." — Preface  to  the  collected  edition  of  hit 
contributions  to  the  'Edinburgh  Review,'  1843. 


534  FROM   1820. 

of  apprehension  almost  intuitive,  with  judicious  and  calm  discern- 
ment, with  a  profound  and  penetrating  understanding."  To  this 
it  must  be  added,  that  the  range  of  his  apprehension,  discernment, 
or  penetration  was  not  of  the  widest  order  :  a  man  of  great  activity  ! 
and  decision,  with  much  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  skill  in  the 
management  of  men,  he  yet  did  not  display,  at  least  in  literature, 
the  highest  power  of  entering  into  the  feelings  of  others,  of  under- 
standing the  position  of  men  very  different  in  character  from  him- 
self. In  his  criticisms  of  Wordsworth  we  see  vividly  at  once  his 
own  character  and  his  failure  to  appreciate  a  character  very  differ- 
ent from  his  own.  He  was  an  affectionate  man,  intensely  attached 
to  his  friends,  and  uncontrollably  fond  of  their  society ;  and  the 
passages  that  he  admires  in  Wordsworth  are  chiefly  passages  of 
tenderness.  He  loved  natural  scenery,  too,  in  a  way,  and  does 
justice  to  Wordsworth's  more  striking  word-pictures ;  but  he  was 
too  much  attached  to  "  the  busy  haunts  of  men "  to  follow  the 
raptures  of  a  genuine  nature -worshipper,  and  he  found  Words- 
worth's minute  descriptions  intolerably  tedious.  But  what  he 
chiefly  failed  to  understand,  and  what  chiefly  offended  him,  were 
the  meditations  natural  to  a  recluse,  and  the  glorification  of  chil- 
dren and  of  country  personages  to  a  degree  altogether  out  of  keep- 
ing with  their  conventional  place  in  the  social  scale.  He  was 
constantly  accusing  Wordsworth  of  clothing  the  commonest  com- 
monplaces with  unintelligible  verbiage,  and  of  debasing  tenderness 
with  vulgarity.  A  similar  narrowness,  the  same  tendency  to  lay 
down  the  law  without  a  suspicion  that  other  people  were  differently 
constituted  from  himself,  appears  in  his  essay  on  '  Beauty.'  Him- 
self defective  in  the  feeling  for  colour,  he  denies  that  colour  pos- 
sesses any  intrinsic  beauty,  and  is  utterly  sceptical  regarding  the 
statements  of  artists  and  connoisseurs,  suspecting  them  of  pedantry 
and  jargon.  His  style  is  forcible  and  copious,  without  any  pre- 
tence to  finished  or  elegant  structure.  His  diction  is  perhaps  too 
overflowing;  his  powers  of  amplification  and  illustration  some- 
times ran  away  with  him ;  "  his  memory,"  says  Lockhart,  "  ap- 
peared to  range  the  dictionary  from  A  to  Z,  and  he  had  not  the 
self-denial  to  spare  his  readers  the  redundance  which  delighted 
himself."  His  collected  works  give  but  a  feeble  idea  of  the  clever- 
ness of  his  ridicule ;  he  refused  Jo  republish  the  most  striking 
specimens  of  his  satirical  skill. 

Conjoined  with  Jeffrey  in  the  origination  of  the  'Edinburgh 
Review'  was  the  Rev.  Sydney  Smith  (1771-1845),  the  most  bril- 
liant wit  of  his  generation.  The  son  of  an  eccentric  English 
gentleman,  he  was  educated  at  Winchester  and  at  Oxford,  and 
then  set  adrift  to  push  his  own  fortunes.  He  wished  to  study  for 
the  bar,  but  was  under  (he  necessity  of  entering  the  Church.  For 
three  years  he  acted  as  curate  in  a  small  village  in  the  midst  of 


SYDNEY   SMITH.  535 

Salisbury  Plain.  In  1797,  being  appointed  travelling  tutor  to  the 
son  of  the  parish  squire,  he  set  out  with  his  pupil  for  the  Univer- 
sity of  Weimar,  but  was  forced  by  the  political  storm  then  raging 
on  the  Continent  to  put  into  Edinburgh.  Here  he  found  a  conge- 
nial group  of  aspiring  young  men,  most  of  them  fortuneless  like 
himself,  and  linked  together  by  agreement  in  unpopular  political 
views :  among  these,  some  four  or  five  years  after  his  arrival,  he 
suggested  the  idea  of  a  quarterly  periodical  as  a  vent  for  their 
opinions  and  their  ambition,  and  himself  took  a  leading  part  in 
writing  and  in  choosing  articles  for  the  first  number  of  the  '  Edin- 
burgh Review.'  He  contributed  to  this  periodical  for  a  quarter 
of  a  century,  until  he  became  a  dignitary  of  the  Church ;  and  his 
strong  sense  and  wit  are  justly  credited  with  a  large  share  of  its 
popularity.  In  1804-5-6  he  lectured  at  the  Royal  Institution  on 
Moral  Philosophy.  Very  slender  recognition  was  given  to  his 
powers  and  his  connection  with  the  rising  Whig  Review :  although 
his  political  friends  were  then  in  office,  he  had  to  accept  the  small 
living  of  Foston-le-Clay  in  Yorkshire ;  and  even  it  was  obtained 
with  some  difficulty.  There  he  remained  for  twenty-two  years. 
In  1828  he  was  presented  by  Lord  Lyndhurst,  a  Conservative,  to 
the  canonry  of  Bristol  Cathedral,  and  from  that  time  ceased  to 
write  for  the  '  Edinburgh  Review.'  Through  the  influence  of  the 
same  nobleman  he  was  enabled  to  exchange  Foston  for  the  living 
of  Combe  Florey,  near  Taunton.  All  that  his  Whig  friends  did  tor 
him  was  to  make  him  a  prebendary  of  St  Paul's  :  this  piece  of  pro- 
motion he  received  in  1831.  His  case  is  sometimes  mentioned  along 
•with  Swift's  as  an  example  of  political  ingratitude ;  the  excuse  for 
not  making  him  a  bishop  was  that  his  writings  were  generally  re- 
garded as  being  inconsistent  with  clerical  decorum.  He  died  on 
the  22d  of  February  1845.  Like  De  Quincey,  Jeffrey,  Wilson,  and 
many  other  less  distinguished  contributors  to  periodical  literature, 
he  has  left  no  great  work  as  a  pre-eminent  monument  of  his  genius ; 
his  Peter  Plymley's  "  Letters  on  the  subject  of  the  Catholics,"  which 
appeared  in  1808,  are  his  most  elaborate  efforts  on  any  one  subject, 
and  they  do  not  extend  beyond  fifty  closely-printed  octavo  pages. 
It  is  perhaps  a  vain  regret  to  wish  that  his  powers  had  been  spent 
upon  sustained  compositions  of  greater  length ;  he  wrote  briefly 
upon  questions  of  passing  interest  with  extraordinary  immediate 
effect ;  he  influenced  as  well  as  gratified  his  contemporaries  ;  and 
now  that  his  objects  have  been  attained  and  the  interest  of  his 
themes  has  been  succeeded  by  other  interests,  the  lovers  of  wit  are 
as  much  entertained  by  his  short  effusions  as  they  would  have  been 
by  more  ambitious  performances. — Both  physically  and  mentally 
Sydney  Smith  belonged  to  the  race  of  giants.  He  was  a  man  of  a 
large  build,  and  of  a  constitution  that  retained  to  his  latest  years 
a  hearty  enjoyment  of  life.  His  wit  and  great  convivial  powers 


536  FROM   1820. 

did  not  prevent  him  from  making  more  solid  attainments :  though 
not  by  any  means  a  profound  scholar,  or  a  logician  of  scholastic 
subtlety,  he  did  not  disdain  to  master  the  dry  facts  of  what  he 
professed  to  discuss  ;  and  he  argued  with  strong  good  sense :  bis 
papers  on  political  questions  are  instructive  and  convincing,  as  well 
as  witty.  "  He  never  came  into  society  without  naturally  and  easily 
taking  the  lead  as,  beyond  all  question,  the  most  agreeable,  sensible, 
and  instructive  guest  and  companion  that  the  oldest  person  living 
could  remember."  His  straitened  means  and  the  enforced  solitude 
of  country  life  were  doubtless  efficacious  in  giving  earnestness  and 
solidity  to  his  character ;  had  genial  company  been  always  within 
his  reach,  he  would  probably  now  have  been  known  only  as  a  con- 
vivial spirit  of  happy  memory.  Regarding  the  mechanical  part  of 
his  style,  Mr  Hayward  l  makes  the  following  criticism  :  "  His  ser- 
mons, which  are  mostly  free  from  mannerism,  prove  that  he  could 
combine  purity  and  correctness  with  force  of  language  when  he 
thought  fit.  But  his  humorous  writings  are  often  deficient  in  ease, 
smoothness,  grace,  rhythm,  and  purity,  because  he  constantly  aimed 
at  effect  by  startling  contrasts,  by  the  juxtaposition  of  incongruous 
images  or  epithets,  or  by  the  use  of  odd  sounding  words  and  strange 
compounds  of  Greek  and  Latin  derivation.  Thus  he  describes  a 
preacher  wiping  his  face  with  his  cambric  '  sudarium,'  and  asks, 
'why  this  h^loplexia  on  sacred  occasions  alone1?'  A  weak  and 
foolish  man  is  'anserous'  and  '  asinine.'  Dr  Parr's  wig  is  the  //.eya 
0a.vp.a  of  barbers,"  &c.  On  these  defects  in  his  composition  it 
would  be  easy  to  insist  too  much  ;  they  are  part  and  parcel  of  the 
pervading  quality  of  his  style.  He  takes  rank  among  our  greatest 
masters  of  the  ludicrous.  He  has  been  surpassed  as  a  wit,  sur- 
passed as  a  humorist,  surpassed  as  a  satirist ;  but  taken  all  in  all, 
both  in  his  writings  and  in  private  society,  he  probably  never  has 
been  surpassed  in  the  power  of  exciting  hearty  laughter.  In  pri- 
vate company  he  seems  to  have  been  irresistible ;  the  more  so  that 
"  there  was  always  plenty  of  bread  to  his  sack ;  the  coruscations 
of  his  humour  were  relieved  not  by  flashes  of  silence,  but  by  the 
moonlight  beams  of  good  feeling  and  good  sense."  With  his  \m- 
failing  buoyancy  of  spirits,  he  could  keep  up  the  flow  of  wit  and 
clever  nonsense  long  after  men  of  ordinary  constitution  would 
have  been  exhausted ;  out  of  the  mere  wealth  of  his  constitution 
he  could  do  what  was  impossible  for  Theodore  Hook  without  an 
extreme  use  of  stimulants.  His  style  has  something  of  the  reported 
character  of  his  conversation ;  mixed  up  with  the  "  infinite  hu- 
mour," we  have  clear  statement  of  pertinent  facts  and  sound  argu- 
ments. We  are  not  conscious  of  any  awkwardness  of  transition 
from  the  comic  to  the  serious  ;  he  usually  writes  with  a  serious 
purpose — with  the  object  of  discrediting,  both  by  reason  and  by 
1  Biographical  and  Critical  Essays,  i.  60, 


CHARLES   LAMB.  537 

ridicule,  something  that  he  disapproves  of.  He  is  often  humorous, 
purely  for  the  sake  of  the  humour,  but  his  prevailing  purposes  are 
serious.  What  is  more,  he  did  not,  like  the  '  Spectator,'  the  '  Ram- 
bler,' and  the  '  Citizen  of  the  World,'  attack  ignorance,  folly,  bigotry, 
and  vice  with  inoffensive  generality,  directing  his  ridicule  against 
imaginary  types  ;  but  he  openly  assailed  and  turned  to  scorn  living 
men,  and  laws,  parties,  and  institutions  that  were  in  actual  exist- 
ence. He  was  far  from  surveying  mankind  with  the  artistic  im- 
partiality of  Goldsmith ;  he  used  his  wit  unmercifully  on  the  side 
of  a  party ;  he  was  one  of  the  most  aggressive  of  the  Edinburgh 
Reviewers.  Anti-revolutionary  alarmists,  the  upholders  of  Catholic 
disabilities,  fanatical  Methodists,  Indian  missionaries,  the  abuse  of 
classical  study,  female  education,  public  schools,  the  Game-laws, 
the  Poor-laws,  the  state  of  prisons,  the  cruel  treatment  of  untried 
prisoners — these  and  suchlike  were  the  objects  of  his  witty  satire 
and  humorous  derision.  Although  a  good-natured  man,  without  a 
trace  of  the  sourness  and  fierceness  of  Swift,  and  now  recognised  as 
having  used  his  powers  in  the  main  on  the  side  of  good  sense  and 
good  feeling,  he  was  most  provokingly  and  audaciously  personal 
in  his  strictures.  This  point  must  be  especially  attended  to  in 
an  estimate  of  Sydney  Smith  as  a  master  of  the  ludicrous ;  the 
mere  fact  of  overt  personality  distinguishes  him  from  all  our  great 
humorists  or  satirists  except  Swift,  and  he  is  distinguished  from 
Swift  by  his  greater  heartiness  of  nature.  He  is  too  complacent, 
too  aboundingly  self-satisfied,  too  buoyantly  full  of  spirits,  to  hate 
anybody ;  but  he  burlesques  them,  derides  them,  and  abuses  them 
with  the  most  exasperating  effrontery — in  a  way  that  is  great  fun 
to  the  reader,  but  exquisite  torture  to  the  victim.  For  short  char- 
acteristic specimens  we  may  refer  to  his  review  of  Dr  Langford's 
sermon,  and  his  Letters  on  the  American  Debts. 

A  humourist  of  a  much  less  robust  and  boisterous  type  than 
Sydney  Smith,  a  humourist  in  a  more  restricted  sense  of  the  word, 
was  the  author  of  the  '  Essays  of  Elia,'  Charles  Lamb  (1775-1834). 
The  son  of  a  lawyer's  clerk  in  the  Inner  Temple,  he  was,  along 
with  Coleridge,  a  scholar  on  the  foundation  of  Christ's  Hospital, 
went  from  that  to  the  South  Sea  House,  and  in  1792  obtained  an 
appointment  in  the  India  House,  where  he  remained  for  thirty-three 
years.  While  his  public  life  was  thus  uneventful,  the  course  of  his 
domestic  life  was  altered  and  saddened  by  a  well-known  tragical 
calamity,  the  result  of  an  outbreak  of  insanity  in  his  only  sister. 
This  took  place  in  1796.  "For  a  time  Mary  was  confined  in  an 
asylum ;  but,  the  fit  passing  off,  she  was  released,  on  her  brother 
giving  a  solemn  undertaking  to  watch  over  her  through  life. 
.  .  .  For  the  sake  of  his  sister,  he  gave  up  the  brighter  pro- 
spects of  life,  .  .  .  abandoning,  it  is  thought,  a  passion  he 
had  conceived  for  a  young  lady  who  is  apparently  alluded  to  in  his 


538  FROM   1820. 

Essays  under  the  designation  of  'Alice  W?  The  history  of  the 
long  association  between  brother  and  sister,  broken  from  time  to 
time  by  a  fresh  accession  of  the  fatal  malady,  is  one  of  the  most 
touching  things  in  fact  or  fiction."  Lamb's  first  appearance  as  an 
author  was  in  1798;  in  that  year  "Charles  Lloyd  and  Charles 
Lamb"  published  'Blank  Verse.'  In  the  same  year  appeared  his 
prose  tale  of  'Rosamond  Gray';  in  1801  his  tragedy  of  'John 
Woodvil,'  an  imitation  of  the  Elizabethan  style,  which  was  merci- 
lessly ridiculed  by  the  Edinburgh  Reviewers.  Shortly  afterwards 
he  wrote  a  farce,  which  also  proved  a  failure.  In  1807  he  pub- 
lished his  '  Tales  from  Shakspeare,'  written  in  conjunction  witli  his 
sister.  He  made  several  contributions  to  Leigh  Hunt's '  Reflector.' 
The  papers  that  established  his  reputation  with  the  public  were 
his  '  Essays  of  Elia,'  which  originally  appeared  in  the  '  London 
Magazine,'  and  were  reprinted  in  a  collected  form  in  1823.  In 
1825  he  retired  from  his  clerkship  with  a  handsome  pension.  He 
gives  a  very  humorous  account  of  his  sensations  on  thus  obtain- 
ing liberty  from  the  routine  of  the  desk,  and  of  the  unhappi- 
ness  that  soon  overtook  him  from  his  having  nothing  to  do. 
He  lived  through  nine  years  of  his  uneasy  leisure,  occasionally 
writing  verses  and  periodical  articles,  but  adding  little  to  his 
literary  reputation.  His  sister  Mary  survived  till  1847  >  but 
after  his  death  her  lunacy  returned,  and  she  had  to  be  placed 
under  restraint — Lamb  was  a  very  different  man  from  the  robust, 
hearty,  buoyant  Sydney  Smith  :  a  spare,  slender  person,  of  ex- 
tremely excitable  nervous  temperament,  of  shy  melancholy  air, 
his  humour  not  an  outcome  of  healthy  animal  spirits,  but  a  pro- 
vision of  the  fancy  to  make  up  for  the  poverty  of  the  constitu- 
tional sources  of  pleasure.  He  had  a  tinge  of  the  insanity  that 
was  developed  in  his  sister;  a  melancholy  capricious  turn;  an 
excitability  that  might  easily  have  been  pushed  beyond  the  limits 
of  self-control.  Two  or  three  glasses  of  wine  excited  him ;  and, 
once  excited,  he  carried  out  the  most  comical  whims  with  an  utter 
recklessness  of  consequences  and  appearances.  Shy  in  general 
society,  he  was  a  man  of  warm  and  deep  affections,  as  was 
evinced  not  only  by  his  lifelong  devotion  to  his  sister,  but  by 
his  excessive  fondness  for  the  company  of  a  few  intimate  friends. 
As  we  often  see  in  an  excitable  nature  not  endowed  with  a  con- 
stitution capable  of  sustaining  much  excitement,  he  hated  bustle, 
agitation,  change — all  the  associations  of  vigorous  energy ;  his 
feelings  were  all  in  favour  of  quiet  and  repose.  He  loved  things 
that  had  been  passively  abandoned  to  the  operations  of  nature- - 
tattered  old  books,  crazy  old  houses,  old-fashioned  pumps  and 
statues ;  he  disliked  brand  -  new  books,  and  execrated  modern 
improvements.  Narrative,  he  said,  teased  him ;  he  had  little 
concern  in  the  progress  of  events ;  he  loved  to  hang  "for  tlit 


WALTER  LANDOR,  539 

thousandth  time  over  some  passage  in  old  Burton,  or  one  of  his 
strange  contemporaries."  His  sociability  and  his  old  habits  led 
him  to  prefer  the  town  to  the  country,  and  his  whimsical  humour 
to  exaggerate  this  preference  in  the  presence  of  the  Lakers ;  but 
in  the  town  his  favourite  haunts  were  suburban  lanes  and  the 
quiet  gardens  of  the  Temple ;  and  he  had  a  genuine  longing  for 
the  "  pretty  pastoral  walks  in  hearty,  homely,  loving  Hertford- 
shire." Akin  to  his  dislike  of  rigorous  energy,  was  his  fondness 
for  oddities,  for  things  that  were  not  braced  up  by  an  effort  to  a 
conventional  standard,  but  seemed  as  if  they  had  whimsically 
followed  their  own  sweet  will — "out-of-the-way  humours  and 
opinions — heads  with  some  diverting  twist  in  them  " — "  things 
quaint,  irregular,  out  of  the  road  of  common  sympathy,"  and 
particularly  the  oddities  of  authorship,  such  as  "  the  beautiful 
obliquities  of  the  Religio  Medici."  He  liked  the  "artificial 
comedy"  of  Congreve  and  Wycherly,  as  a  region  "where  no 
cold  moral  reigns,"  "out  of  which  our  coxcomical  moral  sense 
is  for  a  little  transitory  ease  excluded."  He  wished  people  to 
enjoy  in  imagination  the  comical  invasions  of  strict  morality, 
and  professed  for  himself  that  after  "an  airing  beyond  the 
diocese  of  the  strict  conscience,"  he  "came  back  to  his  cage 
and  his  restraint  the  fresher  and  more  healthy  for  it."  With 
all  Lamb's  whims  and  oddities,  the  foundations  of  his  being 
were  serious  and  substantial.  He  was  a  most  penetrating  ob- 
server and  critic;  his  eye  was  not  easily  diverted  from  the 
heart  of  a  subject  Readers  of  poetry  are  pre-eminently  in- 
debted to  him  for  his  services  in  the  work  of  exhuming  the  old 
dramatic  writers  of  the  Shakspearian  age.  "  He  threw,"  it  has 
been  said,  "  more  and  newer  light  upon  the  genuine  meaning 
of  the  great  masterpieces  of  the  theatre  than  any  other  man; 
and  yet  we  do  not  remember  a  single  instance  in  which  his 
positions  have  been  gainsaid." 

Walter  Savage  Landor  (1775-1864),  author  of  the  poems 
'  Gebir '  and  '  Count  Julian,'  and  who,  as  Byron  said,  "  culti- 
vated much  private  renown  in  the  shape  of  Latin  verses,"  is  by 
some  authorities  placed  in  the  first  rank  among  writers  of  prose. 
His  life  has  recently  been  written  with  great  minuteness  by  Mr 
John  Forster.  He  was  born  in  the  year  of  the  outbreak  of  the 
American  War  (1775),  on  the  3°th  January,  the  anniversary  of 
the  execution  of  Charles  L  From  his  youth  up  he  gave  evidence 
of  an  insubordinate  spirit;  he  had  to  quit  Rugby,  and  subse- 
quently Oxford,  in  consequence  of  misdemeanours,  aggravated 
by  dogged  defiance  of  authority.  After  his  rustication  from 
Oxford  in  the  summer  of  1794,  he  declined  his  father's  desire 
that  he  should  choose  a  profession,  by  way  of  having  something 
to  do;  and  being  heir  to  considerable  estates,  preferred  being 


540  FEOM   1820. 

put  upon  a  yearly  allowance,  with  liberty  to  travel  where  he 
pleased.  His  poem  'Gebir'  was  published  in  1797;  it  was 
highly  praised  by  Southey  in  the  '  Critical  Review,'  but  it  made 
no  impression  on  the  general  public.  As  he  sympathised  with 
the  anti  -  monarchical  enthusiasts  of-  the  period,  his  help  was 
solicited  for  the  current  newspaper  warfare,  and  he  made  several 
contributions  to  journals  then  supported  by  Coleridge  and  Southey. 
The  death  of  his  father  in  1805  made  him  a  wealthy  man,  and  for 
a  year  or  two  thereafter  he  lived  chiefly  at  Bath  in  great  splendour. 
In  1808  he  suddenly  set  out  for  Spain  to  assist  in  the  war  of 
liberation,  but  soon  quarrelled  with  some  of  his  associates  and 
came  back  again.  Shortly  after  his  return,  he  sold  his  paternal 
estates,  bought  Llanthony  in  Monmouthshire,  and  married  "a 
pretty  little  girl,  of  whom  he  seems  literally  to  have  had  no  other 
knowledge  than  that  she  had  more  curls  on  her  head  than  any 
other  girl  in  Bath."  In  1812  appeared  his  tragedy  of  'Count 
Julian,'  the  legendary  traitor  who  introduced  the  Moors  into 
Spain.  While  Wilson  was  living  in  supreme  happiness  at  Elleray, 
poor  Landor  at  Llanthony  was  in  a  Tartarean  broil  of  bitter 
quarrels  with  his  tenants  and  his  neighbours,  the  final  result  of 
which  was  his  departure  from  England  and  his  settlement  in  Italy 
in  1815.  Twenty  years  he  remained  in  Italy,  during  which  his 
only  productions  worthy  of  note  were  the  '  Imaginary  Conversa- 
tions'  (1824-29)  and  'Pericles  and  Aspasia'  (1835).  Throughout 
this  period  his  fractious  temper  involved  him  in  frequent  quarrels 
with  various  Florentine  officials  and  others ;  and  in  1835  an 
irreconcilable  quarrel  with  his  wife  drove  him  back  to  England. 
He  lived  chiefly  at  Bath  for  twenty-one  years,  and  published  in 
1853  'Last  Fruit  off  an  Old  Tree,'  a  volume  containing  a  few 
more  conversations,  and  miscellaneous  odds  and  ends.  In  1858 
he  withdrew  from  England  to  escape  an  action  for  libel  raised 
at  the  instance  of  a  lady  he  had  quarrelled  with ;  and  spent  the 
remaining  six  years  of  his  life  in  Italy. — Landor,  as  De  Quincey 
remarks,  is  one  of  those  authors  about  whose  personal  appearance 
we  have  a  special  curiosity.  He  was,  then,  an  erect,  stout-set 
man,  of  middle  height,  with  a  broad  head  retreating  in  front 
but  very  full  behind,  fair-complexioned  and  grey-eyed,  wearing  in 
later  years  a  peculiarly  venerable  look  from  his  grey  hairs,  broad 
bald  forehead,  and  erect  carriage.  The  headstrong,  overbearing, 
quarrelsome,  ungregarious  side  of  his  character,  is  made  apparent 
by  the  briefest  outline  of  his  social  career.  Towards  his  few  friends 
he  seems  to  have  been  generous  and  overflowingly  affectionate. 
Yet  even  among  friends  admitted  to  his  intimacy  he  was  so 
exacting  and  "  touchy,"  that  they  never  knew  the  moment  when 
they  might  strike  against  a  torpedo  that  should  make  an  irre- 
parable breach.  His  most  intimate  friendships  were  states  of 


WILLIAM   HAZLITT.  541 

unstable  equilibrium.  His  prose  writings  are  better  known  than 
his  poetry ;  yet  it  is  probably  his  poetry  that  is  the  most  secure 
basis  of  his  reputation.  His  crowning  excellence  is  sublimity  of 
conception  :  the  character  of  Count  Julian  is  his  masterpiece,  and 
it  is  ranked  by  so  sober  a  judge  as  De  Quincey  with  the  Satan 
of  Milton  and  the  Prometheus  of  vEschylus.  In  his  'Imaginary 
Conversations,'  as  was  to  be  expected  from  so  wilful  an  egotist, 
dramatic  exhibition  of  character  is  no  part  of  their  excellence. 
Some  critics,  indeed,  profess  to  see  a  great  deal  of  character  in 
some  of  the  dialogues.  But  the  concession  is  made  that  it  is  not 
impossible  that  in  many  cases  he  first  wrote  the  opinions  and  then 
looked  about  for  a  passably  consistent  mouthpiece ;  and  in  many 
cases  personages  are  credited  with  opinions  that  they  are  very 
unlikely  to  have  entertained.  The  '  Conversations '  are  interest- 
ing not  from  their  dramatic  propriety  or  significance,  but  as  the 
vehicles  of  Landor's  own  opinions.  He  does  not  attempt  to 
imitate  the  style  of  literary  interlocutors :  in  the  dialogue  be- 
tween Sir  Philip  Sidney  and  Fulke  Greville,  Greville  talks  the 
language  of  Sidney's  '  Arcadia,'  and  Sidney  the  language  of  Walter 
Landor.  In  his  prose  style  two  points  of  excellence  may  be 
singled  out — the  aphoristic  force  of  his  general  propositions,  and 
the  felicitous  force  of  his  imagery.  In  the  opinion  of  many,  his 
style  has  too  much  force.  In  addition  to  the  vigour  and  occa- 
sional vehemence  of  the  meaning,  the  minute  observer  will  remark 
that  the  words  are  studiously  chosen  for  emphatic  articulation, 
containing  an  unusual  proportion  of  energetic  "  labials,"  a  choice 
doubtless  apt  and  consistent,  but,  like  all  obtrusive  arts,  liable  to 
be  overdone.1 

William  Hazlitt  (1778-1830),  an  eminent  critic,  born  at  Maid- 
stone,  in  Kent,  was  the  son  of  a  Dissenting  minister,  and  was 
carefully  educated  by  his  father  with  a  view  to  the  same  pro- 
fession. As  he  grew  up,  his  own  wishes  did  not  ratify  his  father's 
choice,  and  at  the  age  of  seventeen  he  was  permitted  to  change 
the  direction  of  his  studies,  and  to  indulge  an  ambition  of  becom- 
ing a  great  painter.  He  persevered  in  the  study  and  practice  of 
painting  for  several  years,  and  is  said  to  have  been  prevented  from 
attaining  eminence  only  by  a  too  fastidious  spirit  of  criticism,  and 
a  despair  of  working  up  to  his  high  ideals.  His  first  literary  effort 
was  a  metaphysical  work  on  the  '  Principles  of  Human  Action,' 

1  Landor  is  the  chief  of  De  Quincey's  "  orthographic  mutineers  "  (De  Quincey's 
Works,  xiii.  95) :  "  As  we  are  all  of  us  crazy  when  the  wind  sits  in  some  par- 
ticular quarter,  let  not  Mr  Landor  be  angry  with  me  for  suggesting  that  he  is 
outrageously  crazy  upon  the  one  solitary  subject  of  spelling."  Landor's  views 
about  spelling  and  purity  of  language  in  general  are  to  be  found  in  the  dialoguo 
between  Archdeacon  Hare  and  Walter  Landor  in  '  Last  Fruit  off  an  Old  Tree,' 
and  in  two  '  Imaginary  'Conversations '  between  Johnson  and  Home  Tooke. 


542  FROM   1820. 

published  in  1805,  remarkable  as  advocating  the  disinterested  aide 
in  human  nature.  From  that  date  he  subsisted  by  literature. 
He  wrote  an  abridgment  of  Tucker's  '  Light  of  Nature'  in  1807  ; 
compiled  a  selection  of  Parliamentary  speeches,  under  the  title  of 
'The  Eloquence  of  the  British  Senate,'  in  1808;  and  did  other 
"journey -work"  for  the  booksellers.  In  1813  he  delivered  at 
the  Russell  Institution  a  series  of  lectures  on  English  Philosophy  ; 
a  fact  worth  mention,  as  showing  that  for  many  years  the  chief 
studies  of  the  future  critic  were  philosophical.  About  this  time 
he  became  connected  with  the  press  as  a  contributor  of  political 
and  theatrical  criticisms,  some  of  which  were  afterwards  worked 
up  into  the  volumes  '  Political  Essays '  and  '  A  View  of  the  English 
Stage.'  He  was  first  brought  prominently  into  notice  by  his 
lectures  at  the  Surrey  Institution  on  the  "English  Poets"  (1818), 
on  the  "English  Comic  Writers"  (1819),  and  on  the  "Dramatic 
Literature  of  the  Age  of  Elizabeth"  (1821).  About  the  same 
time  appeared  his  '  Characters  of  Shakspeare's  Plays.'  His  other 
principal  works  were — '  Table  Talk,'  1821-22  ;  the  '  Spirit  of  the 
Age '  (a  series  of  criticisms  on  contemporaries,  bitterly  condemned 
by  nearly  all  reviewers),  1825 ;  the  '  Plain  Speaker,'  a  collection 
of  Essays,  1826  ;  and  his  last  and  greatest  performance, '  The  Life 
of  Napoleon,'  1828-30.  During  the  last  ten  years  of  his  life  he 
was  a  frequent  contributor  to  various  periodicals — the  '  London 
Magazine,'  the  '  Edinburgh  Review,'  the  '  New  Monthly,'  and  the 
'  Monthly.'  He  died  on  the  i8th  of  September  1830. — "  In  person 
Mr  Hazlitt  was  of  the  middle  size,  with  a  handsome  and  eager 
countenance,  worn  by  sickness  and  thought ;  and  dark  hair  which 
had  curled  stiffly  over  the  temples,  arid  was  only  of  late  years 
sprinkled  with  grey.  His  gait  was  slouching  and  awkward,  and 
his  dress  neglected ;  but  when  he  began  to  talk  he  could  not  be 
mistaken  for  a  common  man.  In  the  company  of  persons  with 
whom  he  was  not  familiar,  his  bashfulness  was  painful ;  but  when 
he  became  entirely  at  ease,  and  entered  on  a  favourite  topic,  no 
one's  conversation  was  ever  more  delightful."  He  was  an  excit- 
able man,  of  intense  and  vehement  feelings,  nursing  and  indulging 
excitement  to  dangerous  excess.  He  did  not  criticise  in  cold  blood. 
The  reviewers  of  his  own  time  dwelt  upon  his  intense  love  and 
admiration  for  great  authors  as  one  of  his  "  noblest "  qualifications 
for  the  office  of  critic.  "  He  did  not  square  and  measure  out  his 
judgments  by  the  pedantries  of  dry  and  lifeless  propositions — his 
taste  was  not  the  creature  of  schools  and  canons,  it  was  begotten 
of  Enthusiasm  by  Thought."  Critics  who  admired  this  qualifica- 
tion, as  applied  to  the  great  men  of  former  times,  sharply  resented 
its  application  in  the  '  Spirit  of  the  Age '  to  the  author's  contem- 
poraries. Enthusiasm  was  then  spoken  of  as  "  bad  taste  "  and 
"  affectation  ";  and  poor  Hazlitt  was  told  the  bitter  truth  that  it 


LEIGH   HUNT.  543 

was  his  worst  enemy.  His  criticisms  of  his  contemporaries  seem 
to  us  to  be,  taken  all  in  all,  neither  more  nor  less  just  than  his 
criticisms  of  departed  poets,  comic  writers,  and  dramatists.  In  all 
his  criticisms  alike  he  strikes  us  as  a  man  of  extravagant  sentiment 
and  hyperbolical  expression,  widely  read  in  philosophy  and  in 
general  literature,  a  habitual  and  acute  student  of  human  char- 
acter, more  alive  to  varieties  of  excellence  than  any  of  his  critical 
contemporaries,  excepting  De  Quincey  and  John  Wilson,  and 
more,  perhaps,  than  even  these,  alive  to  what  may  be  called 
varieties  of  mood.  His  judgment  was  liable  to  be  "  deflected " 
by  intemperate  feeling,  generous  or  splenetic.  His  criticisms 
must  be  taken  with  some  grains  of  allowance  on  this  score  before 
we  appreciate  their  substantial  body  of  sound  discernment  He 
often  puts  things  graphically  and  incisively ;  but  his  composition 
strikes  the  general  taste  of  critics  as  wearing  too  much  an  appear- 
ance of  effort,  and  straining  too  much  at  flashing  effects.  "  Haz- 
litt,"  says  De  Quincey,  "  was  not  eloquent,  because  he  was  discon- 
tinuous. No  man  can  be  eloquent  whose  thoughts  are  abrupt, 
insulated,  capricious,  and  non-sequacious.  .  .  .  Now  Hazlitt's 
brilliancy  is  seen  chiefly  in  separate  splinterings  of  phrase  or  image 
which  throw  upon  the  eye  a  vitreous  scintillation  for  a  moment, 
but  spread  no  deep  suffusions  of  colour,  and  distribute  no  masses 
of  mighty  shadow.  A  flash,  a  solitary  flash,  and  all  is  gone."  De 
Quincey  objects  also  to  Hazlitt's  habit  of  trite  quotation,  of  orna- 
menting his  pages  with  "  tags  of  verse  and  '  cues '  of  rhyme." 

James  Henry  Leigh  Hunt  (1784-1859),  journalist,  essay-writer, 
book-compiler,  and  poet,  may  be  placed  with  Hazlitt  as  another 
distinguished  member  of  what  was  derisively  termed  "  The  Cock- 
ney School"  He  was  the  son  of  a  West  Indian  lawyer,  settled  at 
Southgate  in  Middlesex,  and  received  his  schooling  at  Christ's 
Hospital  His  father  published  a  collection  of  his  verses  in  1802, 
under  the  title  of  '  Juvenilia,'  when  he  was  but  eighteen — a  col- 
lection which  met  with  a  much  more  favourable  reception  than 
Byron's  'Hours  of  Idleness,'  published  some  five  years  later. 
Throughout  his  life  his  aspirations  and  pursuits  were  exclusively 
literary.  The  short  trial  that  was  made  of  his  business  abilities 
in  a  law  office,  and  subsequently  in  the  War  Office,  could  hardly 
be  said  to  be  an  interruption.  When  he  was  little  more  than 
twenty  he  made  a  sensation  as  a  dramatic  critic  in  his  brother's 
paper,  the  'News.'  In  1808  he  joined  with  his  brother  in  setting 
up  the  '  Examiner,'  designed  as  a  weekly  organ  for  political  views 
more  advanced  than  were  then  current  in  the  press.  The  attacks 
of  the  '  Examiner '  upon  the  Government  involved  it  in  more  than 
one  prosecution  for  libel ;  and  in  1813  our  author  was  indicted  for 
certain  sarcastic  comments  on  the  Prince  Regent,  and  suffered  im- 


544  FROM   1820. 

prisonment  for  two  years,  glorying  in  his  bonds,  and  declining 
several  offers  from  friends  to  pay  his  fine  and  procure  his  release. 
In  1816  his  'Story  of  Rimini'  presented  him  to  the  public  as  a 
poet;  and  as  he  had,  some  years  before,  in  his  '  Feast  of  the  Poets,' 
rather  captiously  insulted  the  whole  of  that  irritable  race,  his  per- 
formance was  reviewed  and  himself  reviled  with  the  utmost  spirit. 
In  1819-21,  he  published  the  'Indicator,'  a  weekly  series  of  essays 
on  the  model  of  the  '  Spectator.'  The  most  notorious  event  in  his 
life,  next  to  his  imprisonment  for  a  political  offence,  was  his  con- 
nection with  Lord  Byron.  He  set  sail  for  Italy  in  1821  to  assist 
Byron  and  Shelley  in  establishing  the  '  Liberal,'  a  projected  new 
light  in  matters  social,  political,  and  religious ;  but  the  scheme 
failed  through  want  of  congeniality  among  the  collaborateurs;  and 
Hunt,  after  his  return  to  England,  published  '  Recollections  of 
Lord  Byron,'  in  which  he  tried  to  exculpate  himself  at  the  expense 
of  his  friend.  He  returned  to  England  in  1825.  For  the  remain- 
ing thirty-four  years  of  his  life  he  lived  as  a  man  of  letters  in 
London,  the  fruits  of  his  pen  being  eked  out  by  occasional  con- 
tributions from  his  friends,  and  after  1847  by  a  Government 
pension  of  ^200,  bestowed  by  Lord  John  Russell.  He  projected 
periodicals — the  '  Companion '  (shortly  after  his  return,  a  contin- 
uation of  the  'Indicator'),  the  'Tatler'  (1830-33),  the  'London 
Journal'  (1834),  and  wrote  to  periodicals  already  established; 
composed  a  fictitious  autobiography  of  Sir  RALPH  ESHER,  a  gentle- 
man of  the  Court  of  Charles  IL  (1832),  a  poem,  'Captain  Sword 
and  Captain  Pen,'  1839,  and  a  play,  'The  Legend  of  Florence,' 
1840 ;  and  published  various  compilations,  criticisms,  and  books 
of  gossip — 'Imagination  and  Fancy,'  1845;  'Wit  and  Humour,' 
1846  ;  '  Stories  from  the  Italian  Poets,'  1846  ;  '  Men,  Women,  and 
Books'  (a  collection  from  his  periodical  essays),  1847 ;  'A  Jar  of 
Honey  from  Mount  Hybla,'  1847;  'The  Town,'  1848;  'Autobio- 
graphy,' 1850;  'The  Religion  of  the  Heart,'  1853;  'The  Old 
Court  Suburb,'  1855.  He  died  on  the  28th  of  August  1859. — He 
is  described  as  a  rather  tall  man,  of  dark  complexion,  with  erect 
carriage,  and  engaging  liveliness  and  suavity  of  address.  "  His 
hair  was  black  and  shining,  and  slightly  inclined  to  wave ;  his 
head  was  high,  his  forehead  straight  and  white,  his  eyes  black  and 
sparkling."  The  inner  as  well  as  the  outer  man  differed  consider- 
ably from  the  typical  John  Bull  He  was  ruled  by  sentiment.  His 
capacities  for  business  were  of  the  poorest  order.  He  had  no  sense 
of  the  value  of  money,  and  would  often  have  been  in  great  distress 
had  not  the  amiability  of  his  character  procured  him  relief  from 
the  generosity  of  his  friends.  As  a  youth  he  was  spoiled  by  the 
praise  of  his  precocity;  overweeningly  self-complacent,  he  sat  in 
judgment  with  a  patronising  air  upon  his  elders  and  superiors, 
and,  meaning  no  harm  in  the  world,  made  hosts  of  enemies  on 


JOHN   WILSON.  545 

every  side.  When  his  eyes  were  opened  to  the  unconscious  offen- 
siveness  of  his  behaviour,  he  appeared  in  a  more  amiable  aspect 
His  '  Autobiography '  is  brimming  with  expressions  of  goodwill  to 
all  mankind,  and  frank  confession  of  youthful  offences.  His  phil- 
anthropic sentiment  was  overflowing.  Uncle  Toby  was  his  ideal 
— "  divine  Uncle  Toby."  "  He  who  created  Uncle  Toby  was 
the  wisest  man  since  the  days  of  Shakspeare."  "As  long  as  the 
character  of  Toby  Shandy  finds  an  echo  in  the  heart  of  man,  the 
heart  of  man  is  noble."  In  point  of  style,  his  model  was  Addison. 
In  simplicity  and  felicitous  grace  of  expression  he  may  be  con- 
trasted with  the  more  robust  and  careless  vigour  predominant  in 
the  early  days  of  the  'Edinburgh  Review'  and  '  Blackwood.'  He 
particularly  excels  in  graceful  touches  of  humorous  caricature. 

John  Wilson,  "  Christopher  North "  (1785-1854),  was  the  son 
of  a  prosperous  manufacturer  in  Paisley.  When  he  was  six  or 
seven  years  old,  he  was  placed  under  the  care  of  the  minister 
of  the  neighbouring  parish  of  Mearns,  and  displayed  from  the 
first  his  singular  union  of  muscular  vigour  with  love  of  intel- 
lectual distinction.  Jack  was  anything  but  a  dull  boy;  his  en- 
thusiasm for  angling  and  other  sports,1  and  his  rattling  youthful 
eloquence,  were  no  less  conspicuous  than  his  quickness  in  book- 
learning.  He  studied  at  Glasgow,  and  subsequently  at  Oxford. 
At  Glasgow  he  carried  off  the  first  prize  in  the  Logic  class  ;  and  at 
Oxford,  besides  being  distinguished  as  a  boxer  and  as  the  best  far- 
leaper  of  his  day  in  England,  he  was  said  to  have  passed  for  his 
degree  "  the  most  illustrious  examination  within  the  memory  of 
man."  He  left  Oxford  in  1807,  and  soon  after,  having  purchased 
the  beautiful  residence  of  Elleray  on  the  banks  of  the  Windermere, 
he  married,  and  lived  there  for  several  years  in  Utopian  health  and 
happiness,  surrounded  by  the  finest  of  scenery,  and  varying  his 
poem-writing  and  halcyon  peace  with  walking  excursions  and  jovial 
visits  from  friends  that,  like  himself,  entered  with  zest  into  the 
hearty  enjoyment  of  life.  During  this  period  he  wrote  his  '  Isle 
of  Palms,'  a  beautiful  reflection  of  the  soft  passage  of  his  days.  In 
1815,  in  consequence  of  pecuniary  embarrassment,  brought  on  by 
the  misfortunes  of  the  trustee  of  his  father's  property,  he  was 
under  the  necessity  of  choosing  a  profession,  and  decided  for  the 
Scottish  bar.  He  made  no  effort  to  secure  a  practice.  In  1820 
he  was  appointed  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy  in  Edinburgh. 
The  duties  of  this  Chair  he  discharged  till  1851,  when  he  retired 
upon  a  pension  of  ^300,  all  the  more  gratifying  as  a  mark  of 
public  respect  that  it  was  bestowed  by  his  political  enemies.  But 
the  most  brilliant  side  of  his  life  was  his  activity  in  connection 
with  '  Blackwood's  Magazine,'  which,  after  a  short  tentative  flight, 
1  See  Recreations  of  Christopher  North. 
2  M 


546  FKOM   1820. 

was  in  1817  fairly  started  in  its  present  character  with  "Chris- 
topher North  "  as  its  leading  contributor.  When  Wilson  gave  up 
his  residence  at  Elleray,  he  was,  writes  Professor  Ferrier,1  "  after 
sundry  pleasant  overtures  from  Jeffrey,  and  the  composition  of  one 
eloquent  article  on  '  Childe  Harold '  for  the  '  Edinburgh  Review,' 
induced  finally  to  cement  a  perpetual  treaty  with  Mr  Blackwood, 
and  to  act,  for  months  and  years,  as  the  animating  soul  of  his 
celebrated  Magazine."  It  was  not,  however,  by  a  jump,  or  even 
rapidly,  that  Wilson  attained  to  the  full  command  of  his  powers, 
or  the  Magazine  to  a  lucrative  circulation.  It  was  established  in 
1817  ;  but  it  was  not  until  1825  that  that  brilliant  succession  of 
articles  from  Wilson's  pen  began  to  appear,  which  brought  fame 
to  him  and  a  shoal  of  subscribers  to  the  Magazine.  For  the  ten 
following  years,  his  industry  never  flagged.  About  1836  it  became 
somewhat  intermittent,  although,  until  near  the  close  of  his  life,  it 
was  still  powerfully  exerted.  "  Dies  Boreales  "  were  the  last  con- 
tributions from  his  pen  to  '  Blackwood's  Magazine.'  2  All  his  prose 
writings  made  their  first  appearance  in  '  Maga,'  as  he  delighted  to 
call  the  Magazine ;  after  his  death  the  principal  of  them  were 
collected  and  published  by  the  Messrs  Blackwood  under  the  editor- 
ship of  his  son-in-law  Professor  Ferrier. — The  numerous  floating 
traditions  of  "  Christopher  North's"  commanding  personal  appear- 
ance and  physical  prowess  have  always  made  him  one  of  the  most 
popular  of  literary  characters.  The  graceful  dignity  of  his  carriage, 
and  the  length  of  limb  and  peculiar  formation  of  heel  that  gave  him 
his  extraordinary  superiority  as  a  far-leaper,  are  recorded  with 
characteristic  minuteness  in  De  Quincey's  sketch.  De  Quincey 
also  dwells  upon  the  popularity  of  his  manners — his  frank,  open 
affability  to  all  comers,  his  "  infinite  gamut "  of  acquaintance  from 
college  "Don"  to  groom,  ostler,  and  stable-boy.  His  writings 
were  no  less  popular  than  his  person.  As  a  critic  he  did  not  pos- 
sess De  Quincey's  subtle  power  of  entering  into  characters  different 
from  his  own  (in  that  respect  De  Quincey  probably  stood  alone 
among  his  contemporaries) ;  but  his  sympathies  were  so  broad  that 
it  is  not  easy  to  define  their  limits.  His  strong  pleasure  in  natural 
scenery,  the  native  susceptibility  of  his  eye  to  colour  and  form, 
gave  him  a  wider  compass  than  Jeffrey,  and  was  the  secret  of  his 
enthusiastic  advocacy  of  Wordsworth,  as  a  corresponding  deficiency 
was  the  secret  of  Jeffrey's  no  less  earnest  depreciation.  When  we 
compare  his  review  of  Lord  Tennyson's  early  poems  with  Lockhart's 

*  In  Mackenzie's  Imperial  Dictionary  of  Biography. 

2  Among  the  early  contributors  to  this  Magazine,  which  introduced  a  new  era 
In  periodical  writing,  being  the  iirst  parent  of  all  the  magazines  that  now  swim 
the  literary  stream,  were  John  Gibson  Lockhart,  Captain  Hamilton  (author  of 
'Cyril  Thornton,'  a  brother  of  Sir  Willian  Hamilton),  John  Gait  (author  of 
'Annals  of  the  Parish'),  Mrs  llemans,  David  M.  Moir  ('' Delta"),  Sir  Archibald 
Alison,  De  Quincey,  and  other  well-kuowu  names. 


JOHN   GIBSON  LOCKHAKT.  547 

review  of  the  same  publication  in  the  '  Quarterly,'  we  see  that  this 
nature-interest,  this  additional  "  bump  "  or  bumps,  overbalanced  his 
repugnance  to  the  admixture  of  the  "  Cockney  "  element,  and  the 
pseudo-metaphysical  "  drivel,"  that  irreconcilably  offended  his  early 
friend  and  associate.  As  regards  Wilson's  style,  it  has  been  said 
by  Mr  Hallam  that  "his  eloquence  is  like  the  rush  of  mighty 
•waters."  He  greatly  admired  Jeremy  Taylor;  and  while,  from 
temperament,  he  does  not  display  the  same  habitual  breathless 
eagerness  in  the  accumulation  of  words,  but  pours  out  his  full 
eloquence  with  less  appearance  of  excitement,  he  often  reminds  us 
of  Taylor's  manner  in  his  way  of  following  out  picturesque  simil- 
itudes. Comparing  them  upon  one  point  only,  and  disregard- 
ing other  characteristics,  we  should  say  that  of  the  two  Taylor  is 
the  more  rhetorical,  and  Wilson  the  more  eloquent :  Taylor  rather 
accumulates  his  wealth  of  expression  upon  given  themes ;  Wilson 
flows  out  spontaneously  and  often  somewhat  irrelevantly  to  the 
subject  in  hand,  concerning  what  strongly  interested  him  in  real 
life :  Taylor  can  flexibly  bring  his  powers  to  bear  upon  any  sub- 
ject ;  Wilson,  although  from  the  width  of  his  interests  the  distinc- 
tion is  not  glaringly  obtrusive,  is  copious  only  when  he  happens 
to  strike  a  plentiful  spring  in  his  own  nature.  With  all  Wilson's 
Nimrod  force  and  abounding  animal  spirits,  perhaps  his  richest 
and  most  original  vein  of  expression  is  connected  with  his  love  of 
peaceful  beauties  in  natural  scenery.  A  very  high  tribute  both 
to  his  judgment  and  to  his  powers  of  illustration  is  paid  by  De 
Quincey  when  he  says  that  from  Wilson's  contributions  to  '  Black- 
wood's  Magazine,'  and  more  especially  from  his  meditative  ex- 
aminations of  great  poets  ancient  and  modern,  zflorUegium  might 
be  compiled  of  thoughts  more  profound  and  more  gorgeously 
illustrated  than  exist  elsewhere  in  human  composition. 

John  Gibson  Lockhart  (1794-1854),  already  mentioned  in  con- 
nection with  '  Blackwood's  Magazine,'  was  editor  of  the  '  Quarterly 
Review'  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century,  from  1826  to  1853. 
The  son  of  a  Scotch  parish  minister  in  Lanarkshire,  he  was  a  dis- 
tinguished student  at  Glasgow  College,  and  at  the  close  of  his  cur- 
riculum was  presented  to  one  of  the  Snell  exhibitions  for  Balliol 
College,  Oxford.  In  the  final  examination  at  Oxford  in  1813,  he 
took  a  first-class  in  classics.  After  a  visit  to  Germany,  in  the 
course  of  which  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  Goethe,  he  fixed  his 
residence  in  Edinburgh,  and  was  called  to  the  Scotch  bar  in  1816. 
Like  several  other  young  lawyers  of  the  same  date,  his  profession  was 
more  literature  than  law.  He  co-operated  with  Wilson  in  the  inau- 
guration of  '  Blackwood's  Magazine'  in  1817.  He  had  a  principal 
hand  in  the  famous  '  Chaldee  Manuscript' l  In  1819  he  published 

1  This  pungent  production  appeared  in  the  seventh  number  of  '  Blackwood'a 
Magazine,  the  first  number  contributed  to  by  Wilson  and  Lockhart.  It  was 


548  FROM  1820. 

'  Peter's  Letters  to  his  Kinsfolk,'  satirical  sketches  of  Edinburgh  men 
of  the  time.  In  the  following  year  he  married  the  eldest  daughter 
of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  who  fitted  up  for  the  reception  of  the  youthful 
pair  the  little  cottage  of  Chiefswood,  near  Abbotsford.  Here  he 
produced  in  rapid  succession  his  '  Metrical  Translations  of  Spanish 
Ballads,'  and  his  four  novels,  'Valerius,'  'Adam  Blair,'  'Reginald 
Dalton,'  and  '  Matthew  Wald.'  From  1826,  when  he  accepted  the 
editorship  of  the  '  Quarterly  Review,'  he  resided  in  London  ;  and 
besides  his  editorial  duties  and  his  own  contributions  to  the  peri- 
odical, which  were  upwards  of  a  hundred  in  number,  he  found 
time  to  write  his  '  Life  of  Burns '  for  '  Constable's  Miscellany ' 
(1827),  his  'Life  of  Napoleon'  for  'Murray's  Family  Library' 
(1829),  and  his  greatest  work,  the  'Life  of  Scott,'  the  last  volume 
of  which  appeared  in  1838. — Lockhart  was  a  thin,  dark,  erect 
figure,  proud  and  reserved  in  general  society,  and  regarded  with 
some  fear  on  account  of  his  sarcastic  ways  ;  but  among  his  chosen 
companions,  at  least  in  his  earlier  and  happier  years,  loved  for  his 
exuberance  of  animal  spirits  and  his  irrepressible  flow  of  wit  and 
humour.  The  kindliness  that  was  not  distributed  promiscuously, 
made  itself  felt  all  the  more  strongly  within  the  chosen  circle.  He 
made  numerous  enemies,  especially  during  his  career  in  Edinburgh, 
by  the  tormenting  force  of  his  ridicule,  by  his  ingenuity  in  driving 
rusty  nails  into  the  most  vulnerable  parts  of  his  victims  ;  yet  more 
acts  of  generous  kindness  and  high  integrity  are  recorded  of  him 
than  can  be  placed  to  the  credit  of  many  men  of  more  philan- 
thropic professions  and  greater  general  suavity  of  manner.  As 
a  critical  potentate  "he  was  kind  and  considerate  towards  un- 
pretending merit,  ready  to  recognise  and  welcome  real  talent  in 
friend  or  foe,  and  severe  only  where  presumption  went  hand  in 
hand  with  ignorance."  Much  of  his  power  as  a  writer  depended 
upon  his  penetrating  knowledge  of  character.  The  most  notable 
feature  in  his  novels  and  tales  is  the  development  of  thought,  feel- 
ing, and  purpose,  under  the  influence  of  circumstances :  he  loves 
particularly  to  play  upon  natural  mistakes,  and  the  consequences  of 
natural  mistakes,  in  the  interpretation  of  appearances.  His  most- 
admired  articles  in  the  '  Quarterly '  are  biographical.  Throughout 
his  life  the  study  of  character  seems  to  have  been  his  prevailing 
study :  we  trace  the  natural  bent  towards  it  in  his  boyish  carica 
tures,  and  we  have  the  first  memorable  fruits  of  it  in  '  Peter's 
Letters.'  The  'Life  of  Burns'  is  a  good  specimen  of  his  power: 
when  we  compare  this  work  with  Dr  Currie's,  we  are  most  forcibly 
struck  with  Lockhart's  skill  in  weaving  out  of  crude  material 
a  coherent  narrative  of  characteristic  incidents.  No  student  of 

written  in  the  style  of  the  Old  Testament  Its  clever  personalities  made  such  a 
sensation  that  it  was  withdrawn  from  the  second  edition  of  the  number.  (See 
Wilson's  Works,  voL  iv.) 


JOHN   GIBSON   LOCKHART.  549 

biography  can  afford  to  overlook  Lockhart.  Apart  from  his  skill 
in  choosing  significant  circumstances,  he  is  peculiarly  distinguished 
by  his  faithful  adherence  to  reality :  his  biographies  are  remark- 
ably free  from  the  distortions  of  romance  and  hero-worship.  He 
objected  on  several  grounds  to  the  writing  of  the  lives  of  persons 
recently  deceased ;  but  he  held  that  if  "  contemporaneous  bio- 
graphy," as  he  called  it,  is  to  be  permitted,  the  biographers  should 
be  peculiarly  careful  not  to  make  in  favour  of  the  hero  suppressions 
that  might  do  injustice  to  other  persons  concerned.  It  was  prob- 
ably in  pursuance  of  this  principle  that  he  made  revelations  con- 
cerning Scott  which  extreme  admirers  of  the  poet  would  rather  he 
had  left  unsaid.  Lockhart's  is  not  a  studied,  finished  style,  but  he 
had  a  great  mastery  of  language,  and  is  exceedingly  fresh  and 
varied  in  his  diction.  His  characteristic  qualities  are  keen  incisive 
force,  and  sarcastic  exuberant  wik 


INDEX    OF   PKINCIPAL   NAMES, 


PAGB 

Butler,  Samuel,      . 

•        •         306 

Alison,  Rev.  A., 
„      Sir  A., 
Andrewes, 
Arbuthnot, 
Ascham, 
Ashmole, 
Atterbury, 
Aubrey, 

BACON,  FRANCIS,    . 
Baker,     .        .        . 

528 

255 

408 

197 

305 

401 
343 

.  239-255 

Butter,  .        .        . 

Carmlen,          .        . 
Campbell,  John,    . 
Campbell,  George,  . 
Capgrave,       .        . 

CAULYLE,       . 

Carte,     .        .        . 
Cartwright,    .        . 
Cavendish,     .        . 

.       .          263 

235 
437 
•  474.  478 
.        .          187 
(  131-180,  44,  191, 
I                 195.  328 
437 
233 

IQ3 

Caxton,  .        .        . 

.          .              187 

Chalmers,       .        , 

C23 

.        .          478 

Charleton,      .        . 

•              344, 

Cheke,    .        .        . 

196 

Bentley,         .        . 

4°7 

Chillingworth,        . 
Chubb,   . 

t           .              258 

,           .             429 

Berners,  Juliana,   . 

188 
r8o 

Clarendon,     .        . 

3«>4 

438 

Blackwell,      .        . 

438 

Coleridge,       .        . 
Collins,  .         .         . 

5*9 

AC'S 

Conybeare,     .        . 

•              42Q 

Bolingbroke,  .        . 

.        •          410 

Cotton,  .        .        . 
Coverdale,      .        . 

235 

•        •          J94 

COWLET,         .        . 

.   280-208 

Boyle. 

Brown,  John,         . 

43Q 

Brown,  Peter,         . 
Brown,  Thomas,     . 

404 

.        .          5*6 

3O7 

Cumberland,  .        . 

•         •           341 

3O  I 

2^8 

(  31-76,    IOO.     1*37, 

DB  QUINCET,  . 

1  138,  379,  488,  546 

Burnet  Gilbert      . 

Burnet,  Thomas,    . 
Burton,  .         .        . 
Butler,  Joseph, 

•        •          339 
.        .          262 
430 

Disraeli,  I.,     .         . 
Doddridge,     .        . 

•        •          520 

INDEX   OF   PRINCIPAL   NAMES. 


551 


Hutcheson, 
Hyde  (Clarendon), 

433 
•          3°4 

Dugdale,         ... 

305 

Jeffrey,           .        . 
JOHNSON 

532 

Ellwood,         ... 

•          340 

Jonson,  Ben,           . 

.        .          260 

Erskine,          ... 

433 

Kames,  Lord,         . 
Kennet, 
Eeunicot,        .        . 
Kuolles,          .        . 

Lamb,     .        .        . 
Landor,           .        . 
Lardner,         .        . 

.          479 
407 
.        .          432 

537 
539 
431 

Fabyan,          . 
Felltham,       . 
Field,      . 
Fortescue,       . 
Foster,  James, 
Foster,  John, 
Fox,  George,  . 
Foxe,  John,    . 
Francis,  .        . 

188 
306 

855 
186 

301 
196 
488 

Law,  Edmund,       . 
Law,  William, 
Leland,  John, 
Leland,  Dr  John,    . 

432 
432 
.          192 

FULLER,        ... 
Gauden,          .        .        • 

.   864-274 
3" 

L'Estrange,     .        . 

343 

GOLDSMITH,  ... 

Guthrie,          ... 

Hakluyt,        ... 
Hale,      .... 

.  461-473 
437 

•          «36 

Lockhart,       .        . 

340 
547 

f  77-  130 
MAOAULAY,      <     331, 
(    486, 
Mackenzie, 
Mackintosh,           . 
Malory,           .        . 

,  172,  177,  252, 
342,  419,  485. 
527 
342 
521 
.          189 

Hales,     .... 

Halifax  

Hall,  Edward,        .        . 
Hall,  Joseph,          .        . 
HALL,  ROBERT,      .       . 
Hallain,  .... 

.          192 
257 
•  504-513 
527 

Harrington,    ... 
Harris,  James,        .        . 
Harris,  William,    .        . 

3*3 
439 
437 

Mandeville,  Ber.  de, 
Mandeville,  Sir  John, 
Manley,  Mrs, 
Marprelate,    . 
May,       .        . 

404 
.        .          183 
.        .          408 
233 

305 

Hazlitt,  .... 
Hayward,  Sir  John,        . 
Hayward,  A.  C.,     .        . 
Herbert  (of  Cherbury)^  . 
Hervey,  James,      .        . 
Hervey,  Lord,         .        . 

*    o     231 
•  489,  536 
•          260 
•          432 
437 

Middleton,     . 
Mill,  James,  . 
Milner,  Isaac, 
Milner,  Joseph, 
Milton,  . 
Mitford, 

437 
525 

5H 
.        •          310 

Monboddo,     . 
More,  Henry, 
More,  Sir  T., 
Morgan,          . 
Morton,          . 

Needham,       .        . 
Newton,  Sir  Isaac, 
Newton,  Thomas,  . 

3°9 
.          189 
.          429 
255 

•        •          3T4 

344 

432 

Hobbes,          .        .        « 
Holinshed,      •        .        . 
Hooke,  .... 

Hooker,  John,        .        . 
HOOKKR,  RICHARD,        . 

•          198 
•          437 
.          199 
.   313-227 

Howell,  ...» 

305 

Hume,    .... 
Hunt,  Leigh,  .        .        . 

•          434 
543 

552 


INDEX   OF  PRINCIPAL  NAMES. 


PALKT,           .       .       . 

.  492-S04 

Stanihurst,     .        . 
STEELE,          .        . 
Stewart,          .        . 
Stillingfleet,  . 

199 
.  392-400 
516 
337 

Pecock,           ,     *   ,        . 

186 

Strype,            .        . 

407 

Pepys,             . 
Porteous,        ... 

342 
474 

Swrra,   .       .       , 
TAYLOR,        .       . 

.        .  36l'377 
.        .   274-289 

Priestley,        ... 
Psalmanazar,          .        . 
Purchas,         .        •        • 

477 
437 
.          236 

Tillotson, 
Tindal,           .        . 
Toland, 
Tooke, 
Trevisa,           .        . 
Tucker,           .        . 
Tyndale,        .       . 

Ussher,           .        . 

Wakefield,      .        . 
Walpole,         .        . 
Walton,          .        . 
Warburton,    .        . 
Watson,          .        . 
Watts, 
Wesley,          .        . 
Whitefield,     . 

337 
.        .          4°4 
4°3 
49° 
1  86 
•         •          47<5 
193 

.        .           Si6 
.        .          486 
•        '  309 
431 
SIS 
43« 
433 
433 

345 

Ricardo,          .        .        . 
Robertson,      ... 

5'9 
.          481 

Rutherford,    .        .        . 
Rymer,           ... 

304 
343 

Sanderson,     ... 
Sandys,           ... 
Saville,           ... 
Becker,           ... 
Selden,           .        .        . 
Shaftesbury    .         .        . 
Sherlock,  Thomas,          . 
Sherlock,  William,         . 
Sidney,  Algernon,           . 
SIDNEY,  SIR  P.,      .       . 
Simeon,           .        .        . 
Smith,  Adam,         .        . 
Smith,  Sydney,      .       . 
Smollett,        .        .        • 

•          299 
.          262 

344 
432 
259 

405 
.          4°4 
338 
•          3£4 
.   000-213 

.          480 
534 
•          436 

WiclifiFe, 
Wilkins, 
Wilson,  Arthur,      . 
Wilson,  John,         . 
Wilson,  Thomas,    . 
Wollaston,      .        . 
Wood,            .        . 
Woolston,       .        . 
Wotton, 

184 
3°9 
305 
54S 
197 
.          405 
•        .          343 
.        •          403 
.        .          261 

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